The Puppet Master
by Tumis24
Summary: So here we are again for another story. A young man, far beyond knowledgeable, and far beyond the smarts and athletics of anyone else. Let's see what the world has in store for him...This is a harem story. This was a continuation of the crowd Favorite NENENEP, made with the approval of the original author, but no that that's continued, it's become my own story. Happy reading!
1. Exposition

**A/N: So here we are again. Please note that this version of NENENEP is written by me, Tumis24; AKA 2021:135X. No one calls me that though. The original NENENEP is written by the brilliant Mysterious Mr. DxD, and before we start, I have to give said author a huge shoutout for giving me permission to continue this story. We'll be starting back at chapter one. This is because I've made several changes to the story, just so you don't have to read the same thing over again. I apologize if it's not quite what everyone hoped for, I'm not as skilled as Mr. DxD, and I plan to head in a very different direction that he does. So, if that doesn't break your hope for this story, A. Thank you for giving me a chance, and B. I apologize in advance if this first chapter is not what you want...**

 **Without further ado, Here is the reincarnation of the lost story that everyone loves, NENENEP Re;Born. Chapter one: The exposition Chapter in which our hero meets the purple ditz... Enjoy.**

* * *

 **" _BZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZT!_ "**

"Ergh... son of a... how many times am I...?"

For the third time in a row that week, Max picked himself up off the floor. Glancing over at the clock that had just gone off, the boy brushed his messy orange hair out of his face. He was starting to regret the decision to let his hair grow out a bit, but one look at a mirror reminded him that he looked much better this way. The alarm clock read 7:15, exactly the time that it was supposed to have gone off, but he was not nearly awake as he normally was, mainly due to watching too much anime the night before. He sighed. "That might be problematic," he told himself, "I should've set an alarm to tell me to go to SLEEP... then I might have avoided this... but, such is life. We make mistakes." After finishing his 'way to deep for talking to myself' notation out loud, he pulled himself out of bed, forced himself into his day attire and grabbed a piece of bread, forgetting to toast it, and sticking it in his mouth as he left the house. It wasn't until he was well down his walkway that he realized that the slice of baked dough in his mouth was not as crunchy as it should've been. "Oops... Oh well, minor mistake."

So now we're two paragraphs in, and all we've got is that the boy's name is Max and he has mid length hair. I suppose now is as good a time as any for an exposition. Maximillian Penumbra was a second year high school student, and an exceedingly bright boy at that. His main demise was his own laziness, never really having a reason to care enough to try and succeed, yet even with that, he'd never once failed a quiz, test, project, or a class, and had graduated every grade up until this point with the highest honors. He could only assume it was genetics, mainly due to having never studied for school a day in his life, but when you're put into an orphanage at the age of two, and the orphanage burns down seven years later, then nine-year-old you has to fend for himself in a city, you kind of forget about your parents, mainly because you never quite knew them. Did anyone keep track of how quickly that turned dark? How about we change the subject? Max, or even Maxi, whichever you preferred, was an agreeable sort of guy. Even though he was smart, he wasn't one to ever boast his stats over another's and was very friendly to people he met. On the inside however, Max only feigned diplomacy. He was an introvert, and trying to interact with people drained his energy. He had gotten better over the years, but his childhood hadn't helped. He was more of a boy to tell you you were right, rather than argue his point, problem being, he was never wrong. More so, he had no problem with being 'wrong,' and just sort of rolled with what he had, and learned from his previous mistakes. It might have been a rather lazy way of living, but for Maxi, it was just perfect. He was actually above average height, but not by much, striking up something like 5' 7". For Maxi, that meant that people wouldn't ask for him to reach to get things, and he wouldn't hit his head on the ceiling. Despite being smart and clever, he was rather clumsy at times, though on this walk to school, he'd only tripped twice... on flat ground. Max's orange hair reached a little past his ears, hanging from the front. In the back, it hung just a small part past his shoulders. Stereotypically anime, but that was exactly why he'd done it. Sometimes Max figured that he preferred the people and friends in his animes than in his actual life. That is, he had one friend in real life, and that friend wasn't human, but that's a story for another time. Other than anime, his main hobbies were video games and space, much like a certain pink mustached video blogger.

Speaking of the stereotypical anime scenes however, Max almost felt like he was in one right now. This was the casual walk down the street before bumping into a pretty girl and learning her name. Max paused in place for a moment as he came up to the corner. He actually wasn't in the mood to meet a girl right now, and he didn't have the social skills to pull off a conversation with one. As if to bring his stereotype to a halt, something glimmered in the sky and came crashing down to the ground nearby. Maxi checked his watch, reading 7:23. He had seven minutes to get to school, which was more than enough time, but he REALLY wanted to know what that was. Sure, he would miss a school day, but he did that all the time. Sure, he might miss something important, but this was a once in a lifetime opportunity! After a five minute mental debate, his fascination for discovery and adventure won out over his hunger for knowledge and education. He checked the contents of his lunchbox; depending on how far that thing had landed from here, he might be gone for the whole rest of the day. In his lunchbox was a sandwich cut in two, six drinks (being two waters, two sodas, and two bolt juices (Max's favorite drink, and a powerful energy drink without side-effects at that)) an apple, an orange, two celery sticks, two packs of both chips and cookies, and two cups of pudding with two spoons. One cup was cherry, the other was butterscotch and cinnamon. The reason behind having two spoons, was that Max was very used to sharing his lunch. Very commonly someone would forget theirs, and bribing people with food was very useful, and keeping a person fed made them much more agreeable. Not to mention, making people happy also made him happy, though he had no idea why. He preferred to avoid people, but when he was around them, he liked to be with happy people, and liked to keep himself happy as well. In this manor, he was able to keep his energy up for as long as possible, and enjoyed his time with the people he was talking to. He also kept this amount of food such that he could keep himself fed on the many adventures he liked to take. As a frequenter of anime, manga, video games, and the like, adventures had somehow become a hobby of his as well. Maxi pulled the hood of his white hoodie up over his head, tightened the belt on his dark gray pants, and made sure the neon laces on his red and black shoes were extra tight, then ran off in the direction of the fallen star.

* * *

Standing at the entrance to the woods where the star had fallen, Max sat down and had a half of his sandwich and one of his Bolt Juices. He'd run all the way here, two miles of distance, in **twenty one minutes**.  Fuck you, eleven minute mile. As such, Maxi was rather drained, but the combination of his favorite drink and tasty banana-peanut butter sandwich, his energy was back to its peak after seven minutes of rest. Max packed his food back up and grabbed his drink, then made extra sure that he hadn't left anything laying about. He didn't want to litter or anything, that would just be a dick move in every regard, so rather he packed his garbage into a separate bag and stuck it back into his pack. He'd only actually had about a third of his drink, so held the bottle as he continued to walk, taking a sip here and there to keep his energy and pacing up as he briskly delved into the forest. This was great. At this rate, he'd have that star and be back home before he had any trouble with food at all. When he got to where he was sure the star had landed, there was nothing there. Suddenly, he heard a loud snap, garnering his attention, but he couldn't figure out where from, he didn't have the best ears.

"I'm falling~!"

The voice was playful and sing-songy and didn't seem appropriate for what it was saying, however, Max instantly recognized that the key word in that phrase was 'falling' and that he'd better be prepared to look up, else he was going to have a really bad headache in a few seconds. He looked up, and noted a girl falling from a tree several yards away. Max knew what it meant to fall out of a tree, you could really hurt yourself, and possible break several bones if you got unlucky. He charged through the trees, and dove last moment, catching the girl in a picturesque, almost base-drop kind of a moment, right before she hit the ground. Max then spun in mid air, and pulled the girl close to himself, such as to shield her from any damage as he hit the ground and slid to a stop. He took a moment to calm himself before standing himself up, and helping the girl to her feet.

"You alright?" he asked her, "that looked like quite a fall."

The girl finished brushing herself off, and looked at him as he noted what she looked like for the first time. She was a short, fair skinned girl, with light purple eyes, and hair that was shoulder length, with somewhat messy bangs, and many strands sticking up, a few framing her face even. She had two game pad hair clips, which were kind of adorable, and she also wore a big white hoodie-like dress with purple striped cuffs, lining, and a purple hood. The outfit had pale, ice blue and light lilac accents as well as a zipper section, two big round pockets, a big zipper with an 'N' on it and strings resembling plugs. Around her neck was a simple white choker, and adorning her feet were lilac shoes with blue and white accents, worn with blue and white striped stockings.

"You know,if you keep staring at me like that, you're going to make little ol' me all flustered and stuff, you know?" she began moving her petite body from side to side while making a cute gesture of shyness.

Maxi could very easily imagine someone going 'Huh!?' at the girl's bold statement as they became flustered themselves and had their skin turn a shade of red. Max on the other hand, had nothing of the sort to offer. "You know, you might want to ditch that nasty habit of getting into trouble, there's not always gonna be a hero like me to save you." Did someone press the suave bastard button? Nonetheless, the girl before him blushed slightly and smiled. "Anyway, you didn't answer my question: are you okay?"

The girl touched herself in a few different places, then looked back up at him, "Well, I'm still in one piece at least," that was a good start, "but I guess I'm kinda hungry, does that count as anything?"

"I have some extra food here if you want to share it," Max offered, "I've got enough for both of us, I wind up sharing a lot."

"Sharing your lunch with me already?" she asked him, "Geez, you're not suppose to fall for me just yet, were not there yet, buddy." she said to him in a teasing manner. Maxi started laughing.

"My word," he managed, "And here I though I was full of shit. Thank you for teaching me that I have much to learn in the art of being way too direct."

"Aw, I bet you say that to all the girls. I be-" the purple haired girl paused mid sentence with a look of comedic confusion directed right at him, "What?"

Max laughed again, "Yeah, no, I don't, I don't think any other girl has warranted me saying that." he pulled out his lunch box and laid it out on the ground showing her what he had to eat. "Now then, are you going to join me?" the girl nodded eagerly and sat across the lunchbox from him.

"Is that... pudding?" her eyes filled with sparkles as she saw the treats in his box.

"It certainly is," Maxi said, holding out both the apple and the orange, "but I think that's more of a dessert thing, so which do you want?"

The girl paused for a moment, "Oh... you're absolutely right about that... Pudding tastes better after a meal of good food... and when eating with someone else!" she said this looking up at him with a smile of genuine happiness on her face. It was the first thing she did that actually made Max blush. That smile was both adorable and pretty at the same time. He'd never quite seen anything like it. "I'll take this one." she pointed at the orange.

"Good choice," he said, recovering and keeping his cool, something he took pride in his ability to do. "One sec, I'll get that ready for you." Max pulled a small piece of the peel off the orange, the spun it super fast on the lunch box's lid, then put his finger down in such a way that it caught the peel, but the orange kept spinning, and the peel was removed entirely before it fully came to a stop. "See? now your orange is like most politician's arguments." he told her, handing her the orange. She raised an eyebrow to inquire what he meant. "It simply lacks a peel." It took her a few seconds, but she got it, and started giggling.

After eating their food, Maxi grabbed the two puddings. "Alright, now for the ultimate question," he said, presenting both to her. "Pick one." The girl's face went blank. He turned his head slightly sideways was the girl had gone devoid of any kind of anything in that one moment. Suddenly, she smiled and pointed to the cherry cup.

"That one please!" she said. He handed her the cup and the red spoon, taking the beige spoon for himself as he dug in to his butterscotch-cinnamon treat. After a while, she turned to him, "Hey, can I try a bit of yours?" she asked. he turned to her, spoon in mouth, and raised an eyebrow. Again, not the best ears. "Can I try some of your butterscotch cinnamon pudding? It looks pretty good." he extended his arm to her so she could reach the cup. she took a spoonful and stuck it in her mouth. "Wow!" she said, her eyes sparkling, "It's so sweet, and good, and it melts away on my tongue... wow, I think you showed me my new favorite flavor! Here! I tried yours, so try some of mine!" she took a spoonful of her own, and held it out to him. He took the bite, and savored the taste of the sweet cherry. He had known a kid named Chris once... that was his favorite flavor. That boy had just abruptly disappeared, though. However, Maxi always had the feeling that he was just on a great adventure. He kind of hoped that he might be able to go on one himself.

After they finished their pudding, Max collected up the garbage, scooped it into the bag, and packed everything into his pack. "Welp, I gotta get going, so I'll see ya later. Thanks for eating with me, I enjoyed your company." The girl scrambled to her feet as he walked away.

"Hey, wait up! Don't just go abandoning poor little me!" the purple haired girl quickly caught up to Max and skipped next him to keep up with his much longer legs. The top of her head reached his shoulder, and he liked having her walking next to him. It just sort of brightened his mood to have her around. It was then that he realized that he was walking next to a girl, and whether she was a cosplayer or not, she was really cute in his eyes. Also, talking to her hadn't drained his energy, rather he felt revitalized, as if she'd somehow turned him into an extrovert just so she could talk to him. He kind of liked the feeling.

"Just to warn you, I'm fairly certain that a guy like me, and a cute girl like you, walking next to each other is automatically gonna give people the wrong idea." he told her.

"Oh, so you DO have a crush on little ol' me? Well, I understand. I am the main character after all, so it makes sense." ***** **record scratch** ***** Max stopped walking. Did he hear that correctly? His hearing kind of sucked, so maybe he didn't? He decided that he heard it correctly, and was going to ignore it.

"Sure, let's go with that." he said, "If I'm going to have a crush on someone, why not a pretty girl like you? So then, crush of mine, you gonna tell me your name, or are we gonna go the entire fanfiction referring to you as the purple haired girl?" The girl blushed and giggled at his joke, "You're not the only one who can break the fourth wall, sweetheart." She blushed harder at the nickname, but gave him a sly smile.

"Alright," she said, "Man... maybe you're not just the stereotypical dense protagonist that I thought you were. My name's Neptune! How about you?" He laughed quietly at her enthusiasm.

"Stereotypical dense protagonists are funny and all, but not to the point where I'd act like one. I like to think I have my own charm to me." he told her. "The name's Maximiliian Penumbra. In case that's too much to put in that little dome of yours, you can just call me Max, or Maxi, or whatever you can come up with is fine. Saturn has more moons than I give fucks." Neptune looked at him.

"Saturn has fifty one moons though..." Max looked over at her, surprised that she knew that, but then again...

"Actually, it has sixty moons, Nep. Nine of them just don't have names yet." Neptune gave him a goofy smile.

"Wow, you must be pretty smart to know all that." she said, "I'm not even gonna bother trying to name all of those moons..." Now Max was just showing off.

"Titan, Enceladus, Rhea, Dione, Mimas, Iapetus, Tethys, Janus, Phoebe, Hyperion, Pan, Helene, Epimetheus, Calypso, Prometheus, Atlas, Telesto, Pandora, Methone, Pallene, Daphnis, Kiviuq, Siamaq, Paaliaq, Albiorix, Polydeuces, Iijiraq, Mundifari, Bebhionn, Bergelmir, Tarvos, Skathi, Narvi, Ymir, Anthe, Erriapus, Aegir, Haiti, S/2007 S 2, Suttungr, Thrymr, Greip, Jarnsaxa, Farbauti, Fornjot, Bestla, Hyrrokkin, Loge, Fenrir, Tarqeq, Kari, and those nine that don't yet have names." Neptune just looked at him dumbfounded. "I like to keep myself educated, you know what I mean?" Neptune shook her head clear, then looked at him.

"Blah, blah, blah spare me the details my cute little genius." she teased him. Now it was Max's turn to shake his head.

"You know, people are gonna start thinking we're a couple if you keep doing that." he told her.

"So what?" she asked him, "Maybe we are a couple, did you think about that?"

"Oh, alright then." he said bluntly, Neptune pouting to herself that he hadn't blushed, or even really faltered at that.

"Now then, about what name I can refer to you as..." Neptune said, thinking about what to call her new friend, "How about I call you 'darling?'" Max did his best to stifle the laugh that came up out of that remark. "What? I'm serious."

"That'll do I guess." he said, once again, blunt-ending what Neptune had hoped to achieve. "Well then, I've got some work to do, so," he turned Neptune around and pointed to a small corner shop, "There's your pudding store." and with that, the two headed off their own way, Neptune to the pudding store, and Max, back to his own house.

* * *

It was late when Max was finally content with what he'd achieved. He'd played some Water Memento, getting his character married, saving his child character, and helping his child to grow into the best warrior in the army, he'd also uploaded a new chapter of his fanfiction to the fiction net, and he'd even made an RPG maker version of the story thus far so that his readers could play the story thus far. He made sure to make the game free to play, he didn't want the people's money, he just wanted to provide them with the quality entertainment that was so hard to find nowadays. He checked his cabinets for a cup of pudding before he headed to bed, but alas, he was out of stock. "Shoot..." it was getting late so he hurried to the pudding store to buy some more for the coming weeks.

While he was running to get the treat he so desired he ended up looking back at the randomness that had transpired in the morning with Neptune. Max noted that there was nothing normal about a girl just falling from the sky and, he was beginning to question whether or not there was another mystery to their meeting. The encounter with Neptune began to fascinate him more and more as he walked, so much so that it started to interest him almost as much as anything else he'd ever learned about. Maybe he just had a desire to learn about the things he couldn't understand, and before he knew it he wished he could see her again, such that his questions might yield answers.

"Yeah right, Maxi," he told himself, "as if that type of plot convenient bullshit would ever happen."

"Oh, Daaaaaaaaaaaaaarling!"

"Son of a bitch." he quickly stopped and located where the voice had come from, it was that familiar voice, casual, carefree, yet playful, air headed tone. In other words, every way to Sunday, it was Neptune. She had begun call to him like she was really happy to see him, and casual as always the girl began to skip to him crossing the street completely ignoring an incoming truck. Luckily for Neptune, Maxi was not all brains. Charging forward to catch her for the second time that day, Max dove and caught her midsection, knocking both of them out of the way in time. Thankfully it seemed as though they were both out of harm's way. Max lay on the sidewalk, holding Neptune tightly against himself, Neptune holding on just as tightly to him. He let go of her, and got them both to a standing position. He was still breathing heavily from that adrenaline filled charge. "Said it once, I'll say it again... you might want to ditch that nasty habit of getting into trouble, there's not always gonna be a hero like me to save you."

"Hee hee... whoops?" that's all she had to say, giving him a klutzy, innocent smile

"What are you doing out at this time anyway? It's way too dangerous. You should really head home." He was genuinely concerned for her. She was his friend, and one of the most interesting people he'd ever met.

"Hey, hold it buddy. Why are YOU out this late?" she retorted. He sighed, jabbing a thumb over his shoulder to the pudding shop.

"I was gonna restock." he told her. She instantly understood. He headed into the store to buy his cups of happiness, then left and began to head home, a certain someone following nearby. Max could sense Neptune's presence. He had a sixth sense for the sort of thing. If there was someone of importance nearby, he could feel that they were there. He chuckled, "Stealth is not your forte, is it?" he asked, stopping, but not turning around."

"Oops, did my Nep-stare surprise you? Sorry about that." she said, stepping out from behind the lamp post. He shook his head, and placed his face in his left hand.

"You know, your body isn't so tiny that you can actually hide behind a lamp post and have it work."

"Pervert! So you HAVE been looking at my body! I see how it is!" she teased him. He laughed at this comment after realizing she was only joking, and she gave him a flirtatious wink.

"So, I know it's kind of late but," he took two pudding cups out of his bag, "Shall we?"

"Really?!" her eyes sparkled complimented with a big smile.

"Yeah, otherwise I can't trust a ditz like you to be safe at this time of evening anyway." She smiled and walked up to him.

"Okay, there's this spot I found after you left me and junk, and it probably looks really pretty with all those stars in the sky, so we should eat there!" she emptied the words from her mouth, one word practically overflowing over the next with how excited she was. She held out her hand to him. "Come on, we can hold hands, and I'll show you where it is!" the chance to see countless stars and pudding sounded like a pretty good combination, so Max took Neptune's hand, and allowed her to guide him to where it was that she wanted to take him.

* * *

A pale-fair skinned girl with very long black hair, about waist length, worn up in long pigtails with two-piece black and blue ribbons, walked around an area not too far from where Maxi and Neptune were currently strolling to. Her hair was neatly combed, cleanly framing her face with silky bangs, and very noticeable red eyes. She wore a fancy dress consisting of dark blue, white, red, and small amounts of gold lining and buttons, covering a red and black spiked lining cloth with the breast part white, along with the skirt which was black on both layers. Behind all of this was a blue bow, matching a smaller one worn about her neck and attached to a black and white collar with a gold piece in the center.

"Hmph." The girl huffed as she looked distastefully where three thugs laid flat on their backs unconscious and seeing stars, and not those in the sky. They had mistaken the girl for a cosplayer trying to attract attention, and that's exactly what they gave her, but the wrong kind of attention. The three thugs attempted to force themselves onto her, but she had shown them just how well that would go for them.

"I have to say, I didn't expect these types of repulsive things to spawn here." she checked over herself, ensuring that she was unscathed, "I better be on my guard while I figure a way out of this place. Lastation still needs me." the girl flipped her hair to the side her pig tails flowing in the night breeze as she continued walking. Very soon, she was about to run into a familiar face.

* * *

 **A/N: So two things right off the bat.**

 **The first and most important? If you're still reading this, and you plan to continue, thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed that chapter and the ones that will come.**

 **The second? When I wrote this chapter, that was the correct amount of moons on Saturn. It might be different when everyone reads this... I dunno when that'll be.**

 **Lastly, if you've gotten here and don't plan to continue, then I apologize to you for not meeting your standards. But that's okay, there are many more fictions out there, much better than mine.**

 **As always, I hope you have a lovely evening, and I will see you in the next chapter. See ya!**


	2. The Maid and the One named Black

**A/N: So two things real quick before we get started.**

 **A. Super big thanks and shout out to pardus9. Last chapter, I'll admit, I didn't expect to go very well, but Sir Pardus has reinvigorated my hopes of continuing the fic. Super big thanks to you, mate!**

 **B. This chapter is almost 6,000 words long. Maybe I went a bit overboard, but if you're about to go to sleep, just know that you may be up for a few more minutes. It was also recommended to me, by the original author, to try marking the text less with bold and underlines. I tried that this chapter, so let me know in the comments which you prefer, and I'll adjust my future chapters accordingly.**

 **Without Further ado, here's... _Chapter Two; In which we meet the Maid, and the one whose name is Black_. Enjoy!**

* * *

"So really the moons could have been any sort of space rock at one point. They could have been meteors and asteroids, captured by the gravity of the planet, or they could even have been a part of the planet once and simply spun off of it while it was rotating faster." Maxi explained. He then looked over at Neptune, dull-eyed and bored.

"Wow... talk more dirty to me, why don't ya...?" she said, unentertained. Maxi quietly laughed to himself a bit, he was used to that kind of reaction, perhaps not quite in such a fashion, but that was the general response.

"Well, you asked. I guess that was just more of an answer than you were looking for."

"Sure, sure." she said, taking a deep breath and letting it out through a sigh. Maxi sat there silently, figuring that if there was anything else she wanted, then she would ask. He closed his eyes to enjoy the evening air, taking it in, allowing himself to be soothed by the gentle crashing of waves against the shore. Eventually, he felt a slight pressure against his arm as Neptune leaned over on him, having scooted closer. He looked over at her, her eyes closed, blissfully leaning on his arm. He did nothing about it, it didn't particularly bother him. Matter of fact, he kind of enjoyed the company, after all, the greatest experiences are only so great without someone to share them with. He had, unintentionally, tensed up at first when he felt her there. He wasn't used to such attention. He didn't say anything though, wondering if Neptune was aware of what she was doing. "Dude, you're so tense." she said, adding a playful giggle once she realized just how tense he was.

"Hah... guess I'm not used to this kind of thing." he said, his cheeks slightly reddening and his face slightly heating up. He relaxed as the night passed and after several minutes had passed the two teens looked out into the night sky as they slowly savored their delicious pudding. Neptune had, indeed, shown him a nice isolated spot on the top of a hill. A lone tree and the rest of a fresh green pasture, perfect for sitting on and relaxing, covered the hill. The view was quite a sight to behold, vast and radiant, and in the distance you could see some illuminated buildings, accompanied by stars, both shining with full brightness. In the upper left side, the moon lit up the bay of water as it's beauty shined down upon the Earth. Maxi decided that this was, indeed, the right decision. Even if it was late, he was glad he'd invited Neptune out here to eat some pudding. He felt like he owed her after bailing on her before to do work. Granted, that wasn't really his fault, he was just making a living, but still, he felt obligated to give something back to her. "So now, I've no clue how I've avoided this question for so long but, I probably should ask; Why and how did you come flying down from the sky? I saw you crash down and get stuck in that tree from two miles away, and I'm glad I showed up when I did,otherwise, you could have gotten seriously hurt. Wouldn't want that, would we?"

"Aw..." Neptune cooed, "There you go being all cute again." Maxi had a brief period of six or seven seconds when he genuinely tried to think about when the first few times that he'd been 'cute.' He couldn't think of anything. Neptune was probably just pulling his leg.

"That didn't answer my question..." he noted, not permitting her to dodge said question. It was a legitimate question.

"Meh you're no fun," She teased, "Well I don't really know how that happened. I don't remember anything before coming here, except that I love pudding!" Maxi's face grew skeptical. That sounded like amnesia, and he'd heard of it, and even had experiences with it before. Once or twice he could remember people hitting their heads and losing whatever their life had been up until that point, like someone had reset their memory. He decided not to question how the only thing retained was the trivial desire to ingest semi-solid desserts.

"So you've got amnesia then?" he asked wearily. Sure he had experiences with it, but he'd never had to treat someone with it.

"I... guess so?" Neptune half asked and halfheartedly said as she attempted to crack a smile, trying not to let anything get her down. With such a look, however, Maxi immediately regretted his earlier decision about leaving her to herself. Amnesia was a serious problem, and something that no one should ever have to experience. He silently thanked whatever deity watched over him that he'd never had to experience such a thing himself. He looked down, trying to think about what he could do, closing his eyes, trying to maintain some semblance of control. Neptune opened her eyes from her attempted smile and saw the disheartened look on Maxi's face. She tilted his head upwards towards her hands on his cheeks, adjusting the angle of his head so they were eye to eye again. "Hey, don't worry about it. There's no need to get yourself down over it." This time she spoke with more conviction, and a more genuine expression, but still holding back uncertainty. Maxi could sense that. It was to be expected, having no memories and just showing up out of nowhere would obviously be both unnerving and unsettling. Max only wished he could have stayed with her when he'd met her in the morning, rather than leaving to work. He could only imagine what being alone without memory must have been like.

Seconds passed and they didn't move an inch. Maxi maintained his position, stone-still, not knowing how to react to her soft fingers, so gently placed on his skin. Her eyes mystified him, they seemed to dance with splendor as he looked at them. He wasn't sure what he was feeling at the moment, so he kept himself completely still. Neptune slowly let go of his face, blushing red. "um... anyways..." she reached out and grabbed her snack once more, "this should liven the mood up again! No need to make this all dark and stuff." Max was still concerned, but he regained his composure and grabbed his pudding.

"I suppose..." he eventually replied, proceeding to resume eating as well. He'd brought a variety of puddings with them, and after a while, they'd decided on the vanilla and egg ones. Maxi had grabbed a vanilla and Neptune an egg.

"Hey~, you're vanilla pudding looks yummy, mind if I take a bite?" Neptune asked in her sing-songy tone from before. Maxi giggled a bit.

"Sure, here." Maxi held out his cup as he'd done so the first time, and Neptune had a taste.

"The tantalizing sweetness melts away on my tongue! Ooooooh... it's not quite as good as the Butterscotch-cinnamon one but it's still so good!" Neptune said, her eyes closed, savoring the sweet treat enthusiastically. She held out her cup to Max. "Try this one, I think you'll like this one!" Maxi accepted the spoonful.

"Huh..." he considered its taste for a moment, "Gotta say, I was NOT expecting egg pudding to taste like that. That's my first time trying it." He smiled at Neptune appreciatively. "Thanks for sharing that with me." They sat silently together, once more simply enjoying the view. After a while, the two of them were about to head out, but there was still one major issue unsolved. "So where will you go now?" Maxi asked the girl next to him. Neptune looked up at him, a blank expression on her face. "You have no memory, and as such, no place to go. So what will you do now?"

"Oh," Neptune struggled to find an answer, "I'm sure I'll find somewhere I can rest my little head, don't you worry, darling." She gave him a wry smile, full of uncertainty. Complete silence filled the air for a moment. Neptune was about to walk away, "I guess I'll see ya around, Maxi... Maxi?" Maxi stood and walked over to her, taking her hand.

"My home is big enough to house us both," he said, "so, if you want, you can come stay with me. You know, until you get your memory back. I'd hate to just leave you alone, I've already done that once today." The girl looked at him, her face once more blank. "Sorry, just had to offer. Gotta make sure I don't fuck up twice today." he was about to walk away, when, suddenly, he was caught off guard as she threw herself onto him, wrapping her legs around his waste and hugging her arms around his neck. She pressed the side of her head to his chest, making his heartbeat slightly accelerate.

"Thank you..." she said quietly, pressing herself close to him.

* * *

Neptune clung to Maxi's back as he walked. She had asked him for a piggy-back ride, and Max had no qualms with the suggestion. Neptune was so light, he didn't even have to exert any extra effort to keep the two of them moving. The only very slightly unnerving thing about carrying her home on his back was the body heat she was giving off as a result of being so close to him.

"Hey... um... your back is pretty hard, you know?" Neptune noted. Maxi looked at her over his shoulder.

"That would make sense, my back is mostly bone and the like. Not much cushion." He told her. She sighed in response.

"It's like... sitting on a rock... that produces heat..." She said, tiredly.

"No one said you have to sit on my back." he responded, "The sidewalk does just as well for travel. You'd just have to move yourself rather than me pulling you."

"Nah. This is better..." she said, lightly blushing unbeknownst to the boy carrying her. For whatever reason, she actually felt shy for that one second. She couldn't figure out why, though to be fair she had never had physical contact with someone of the opposite sex like this; it was a new experience for her altogether. After a few minutes Neptune couldn't resist the urge to speak anymore. "Hey... Maxi?"

"Yeees?" he asked, perfectly untroubled, as if carrying her had no more impact on him than carrying the air in his lungs. Neptune didn't waste too much time thinking about it.

"You know, I'm surprised with how patient you are," She told him, "I definitely thought you were tot's going to yell at mwah by now." Maxi turned his head slightly to indicate that he was speaking to her.

"Should I be less patient?" He asked her, "If you want, then I can yell at everything. I like to think I'm quite good at screaming at random things." She flattened herself against his back with a huff.

"Nah." She gently pinched both his cheeks. A playful, and curious gesture as she pulled at his cheeks a bit from behind him with her tiny fingers. Again much to Neptune's surprise, Maxi's patience held firm, and he showed no signs of resistance or resentment to her immature gestures. Neptune thought that, maybe he was beginning to grow fond of them? That's what she hoped at least. Neptune wanted Maxi to grow as fond of her as possible. She was starting to feel like she wanted to be with him as long as she possibly could. After a while, Neptune drifted off into a mini-slumber. Maxi could tell by the quiet sleepy sounds she was making. It was funny, they weren't loud and obnoxious like she was when she was awake, though it didn't matter much, the walls of his house were pretty thick. It was also funny that, normally, he was a gamer and had little regard for his rest since he could go several days without sleeping after getting a good rest. He was also normally full of so much energy that attempting to sleep seemed both arbitrary and improbable, but spending time with Neptune had actually worn him out to the point where he felt like he needed tonight's rest. Maxi's normally vibrant swirling eyes dulled a bit, and Maxi gave a yawn, passing by a girl with twin tails without paying her any mind. He also pretended to miss the fact that she quickly turned around to look at him after they passed each other. He was too tired to question why, so he just kept walking, ignoring the raven-haired girl's odd gesture. The girl in question, however, made sure not to miss any details.

"Light purple hair, spikey lift... That's Neptune..." she glared at the two as Maxi brought them back home, "I wonder why she's here too? And who's that boy with her? And... why is he carrying her...? Not that I care or anything!" she told herself. "Maybe because of what happened then?" her curiosity began eating away at her until she decided she had to have answers, throwing caution to the wind as she decided to tail the two from a safe distance. Finally arriving at the large house's doorstep, Maxi headbutted the door and heard it click from the other side. As he stepped in, the black haired girl's face contorted with disappointment. "Oh, you have to be kidding me! Great...now what do I do? I guess I could wait for them to come out? Or better yet interrogate that boy... That would probably be better... I'll do just that, then. I'll wait right here until he comes out, then I'll make my move!" the girl gave a prideful smirk to herself and sat next to the door, confident that she would be fine.

* * *

"Welcome home, sir." Maxi was welcomed as he entered his house by his maid, Felicia, greeting him at the door. "I tidied up the house while you were gone. Every last room is completely spotless! I made sure of that." Maxi gave a tired laugh.

"You know, when I built you, I think I made you much too energetic and earnest with your job..." Felicia puffed out her cheeks.

"Well if you wanted me to be less energetic, maybe you shouldn't have put a Xenon-diode Solar Refill battery in me!" she exclaimed. To clarify, Felicia was both his service AI, and his maid, the maid part being carried out by an android of sorts, one that looked like an actual human, but was actually a robot with very clever programming. With his surplus of resources and free time, Maxi had made Felicia to keep himself in check. She served as a sort of JARVIS for him if you will. Felicia didn't actually stand for anything, rather it was just the name of a maid from a video game he really liked: the Water Memento game he'd been playing earlier. Now that we're on the subject, Felicia was the aforementioned only friend of Maxi's that wasn't human. Now onto other things.

Maxi's house, for lack of a better description, was a big house, almost that of a mansion. When he'd been abandoned to the streets after his orphanage had burned down, Maxi had become a bit of a rags to riches phenomenon. He'd started on the street, performing tasks and tricks for people for money. He'd later gotten to performing in various tournaments, for anything really, and taking the prize money, and using that. After that had gotten old for him, he'd gotten into writing and game making. Since then, he'd published six books and seven indie-games, the games following the story of the books, such that a more interactive option was available. With all of that combined and a bit of luck, Maxi had made several millions of dollars on his publications, then took that money and put it into a company, buying and selling the stocks with clever timing, almost doubling what he had. When he was done with THAT, he took THAT money and put all of it into making his own business, and reaping the profits of that. He donated most of the proceeds to the government and to charity, that way no one bothered him while he was doing whatever he wanted, but the company basically ran itself, so he used the income to make a big house, just in case he would ever have company, and also to fund himself so he could research things at his leisure. What kinds of things, you may ask? Well, we'll find out about the important ones later. The basic point to get across here, is that Maxi had a mansion suitable to house about fifty of himself. Easily a hundred could fit in comfortably, and possibly upwards of three hundred if he was really trying. Even if he wasn't trying, he had several houses that he could retreat to if he was seeking to avoid attention, and he knew that Felicia would be there, both to cover him, and to welcome him, no matter which one he went to. Needless to say, Housing both Neptune and himself in this house, was not much of a problem.

Getting back to the situation at hand... "So who is that?" Felicia asked, looking at the girl on Maxi's back. Maxi looked at her, and smoothly slid her off his back, shifting her into a bridal carry position.

"A friend of mine," He told his maid, "met her earlier today. We had lunch together. Her name's Neptune. Would you kindly bring her to one of the spare bedrooms for me?" Felicia took Neptune's sleeping body.

"If you answer a question for me, yes I will." Maxi nodded. Even though he'd built Felicia, and she was supposed to be his maid, she was almost considerably to his spouse. Both of them carried respect for the other, and did their best to keep the other happy. That was where the similarities ceased however. Maxi did care for Felicia, and she carried such a feeling in return, but it was not comparable to a husband wife kind of love. Rather, it was even stronger, and the two felt it would be better to remain partners as they were, rather than in a relationship. Maxi had no problem answering questions for Felicia, after all, she was based on a learning AI, and everything she learned improved her ability to be more human-like, and to function better in general. "Is she the reason why you missed school today?" Maxi's expression instantly flat-lined.

"Oh, come one, Felicia! You can I both know that I already know everything they could teach me!" he responded. She frowned at him, giving him the adorable pouty face that was his weakness. He managed not to fall for it. "Felicia, I had more important thing to be doing. I was able to maximize my productivity like this, so I've already handled half of my work for tomorrow!" She pointed a finger at him, accusingly.

"Then you're going to school tomorrow." she told him he swished his hand over his shoulder.

"Yeah, yeah, I'll think about it, and since you're taking so long..." he took Neptune back from Felicia's arms. "I'll handle this. If you really want me to go to school, I'll see what I'm doing tomorrow, but there's a faculty meeting, and I'm fairly certain that they need me for that."

"I'll go in your place." she offered.

Maxi gave her a look. "Fat chance, Felicia. Thanks, but no thanks. I'll see you tomorrow." And with that, he poked the button on the elevator and the doors closed. The screen came on displaying Felicia's face.

"Nice try." He looked at the monitor.

"Son of a bitch..." he sighed to relief himself before talking to the monitor. "I'm not going to school tomorrow. Neptune here's an amnesiac, and I'm more concerned about that than I am about learning arbitrary facts like what the natural logarithm of two hundred forty six is." Felicia opened her mouth to speak, but Maxi cut her off. "I know it's five and a half!" She frowned at him again.

"That's not what I was going to say!" the elevator doors opened up and Maxi stepped out.

"Sure, sure." as he stepped out, his path was intercepted by Felicia's android once more. "How the fuck-?"

"You gave me a teleportation module, remember?" she asked, unamused. He made a face.

"When was this?!" he asked in moderate bewilderment.

"Literally, just earlier today." she reminded him, "you invented teleportation in the back of your mind while you were writing the next chapter of your internet story, sir. After that, you took five minutes to build the first module and gave it to me." Maxi could remember something like that.

"Ah." he continued walking, into one of the spare bedrooms. "Gods, she sleeps like a rock." he said, indicating Neptune, still fast asleep. Felicia gave a light giggle.

"Reminds me of you." she said, teasingly. Maxi looked at her, confused.

"I'm a lighter sleeper than you are, and most times, you're just on standby." Felicia's face went blank as she realized he was right. He shook his head. "Nonetheless, I'm going to bed. Good night, Felicia."

"Good night, sir." she gently pecked his cheek and the two went their separate ways, Maxi heading to his room, Felicia heading to run the last checks of the night.

* * *

The next morning, Maxi woke up to an icy feeling on his cheek. He looked at Felicia with an annoyed look on his face. "That didn't work the first six or seven times, what made you think it would work now?" he asked. She had her hand on his cheek and was using her cooling feature to make her hand icy cold. Maxi wasn't amused. Felicia shrugged.

"You're awake now, so obviously I did something right." He deadpanned at his maid's sarcastic comment.

"Yeah, yeah, sure. Where's Neptune? She awake yet?" Felicia half nodded, half bowed in response.

"She's upstairs eating. I've already made breakfast." Maxi smiled, Felicia proudly smiled back. "I made French toast and eggs with Morning sausage, accompanied by a drink of apple juice, sir." He nodded to her.

"Thanks, Felicia, mind bringing me up there real quick?" She nodded and took him by the shoulders, teleporting into the primary dining room. Neptune sat on one end of the room, stuffing her face with eggs, french toast, and sausages, only taking breaks to have a gulp of juice. "Thank you." He sat at the table and Felicia brought him some food, which he eagerly dug into. Maxi was pretty good at cooking, on a scale of stars, he was about a four and a half out of five, but Felicia was somewhere about a six, and Maxi wasn't sure how, but he didn't question it. He liked good food as much as anyone else. After finishing up, Felicia took care of his plates.

"I trust you will be off to school now?" she asked.

"To the company," Maxi corrected her, "That meeting was rescheduled. I need to be there." Felicia looked at him.

"If you miss today, you will be expelled from the school, sir." he shrugged in response.

"So what? Then I won't have to worry about that anymore. One less thing to occupy my mind." Felicia huffed.

"I hope you realize that I only say what I do because I care..." he nodded.

"I know, Felicia. No one cares about me as much as you do." he gave his maid a hug. "I'll have my earpiece in, so just talk to me if you need me. I'll be home soon enough, I don't expect this to take very long." Felicia smiled and bade him to have a good day as he left. As he did so, Neptune flew past Felicia, slamming into Maxi from behind. Maxi only did a little more than a stumble as a result.

"Maxi!" she complained, "What am I supposed to do?" Maxi made a face of confusion.

"Eat some pudding? Watch some TV? Talk to Felicia? She's a nice person, I swear she is, she only bites on Tuesdays-"

"It's Tuesday, sir." Felicia mused.

"I was joking... I know that..." Neptune cut him off, stomping on the ground.

"I want to go where your going! Where are you going? I wanna go! Pretty please?" she gave him puppy dog eyes, but Maxi just sighed.

"I'm going to a business meeting..." Neptune made a face. "It's going to be a bunch of adults, sitting in a boring grey room, talking to each other about a bunch of stuff that makes no sense to anyone else." Neptune's face filled with recognition. "I'll take you around the city and show you the place after I get back, I promise you that, kay?"

"Oh, okay, never mind then." She turned and walked back into the house. He gave Felicia a look, which she returned with a nod and a glance of confidence.

"I'll be on standby." she said. And with that she turned and walked back into the house after the ditzy purple girl. Maxi turned and hurried down the street, his suit flapping in the wind. It looked like a runner game almost... Nevermind.

As the door slid closed, the black-haired girl was ripped back into the world of the awake as the door touched the other side, shaking the wall just enough to wake her. She quickly got to her feet as she saw Maxi hurry off. "Shoot! I'd better hurry!" as the girl charged after him, she began feeling slightly off, but her pride refused to let her stop as she followed the boy into the city.

Maxi wasn't actually in any sort of hurry, matter of fact, he had more than enough time to get to this meeting, but running there just felt more started wondering if: with someone like Neptune living with him now, would cut his time for anime and the like. Maxi also realized then, that he had no idea what Neptune would want to do. Matter of fact, females in general were confusing to him. It was one of the main reasons he'd built Felicia the way she was; part logic, part ditzy maid girl. He had hoped t would help him learn how girls were, but he'd only wound up more confused. He must have been doing something correctly so far, however, because Neptune seemed to have taken a liking to him. He hoped that would continue, for whatever reason, the idea of making friend with her appealed to him greatly. As he got to the company, the girl following him stopped. The idea of going into the building where a ton of people would be didn't appeal to her. She decided to wait outside the building as she had done with his house, waiting for him to get back.

* * *

As Maxi emerged from the building, he was very satisfied. He'd handled every question with remarkable ease, and had even talked to his faculty a bit and gotten to know them better. To Maxi, it seemed like having a good faculty, and being friendly with said people, getting to know them well, was the basis of a healthy working relation ship, and the path to a good working environment with maximized productivity. Maxi's thoughts were cut short when he heard an audible thud behind him. He turned around to see the same black-haired girl from yesterday, passed out on the floor. He hurried over.

"Hello? Anybody home?" he asked, raising her head up a bit, "um... are you okay? Come on... answer me" she wasn't looking to good and as he placed a hand on her forehead he felt her temperature, she was burning up. "Damn... not good." Maxi could hear footsteps approaching, but he ignored them. he grabbed the earpiece in his ear and pulled the microphone over to his mouth. "Felicia, I might need some assistance here in just a sec." He received confirmation in the form of Felicia on the other end. Unfortunately, his success was cut short by the footsteps coming to a halt just before him. He looked up, greeted by the sight of three thugs standing before him, demanding he step aside. Maxi said nothing, formulating in his mind what plan he would execute.

"Hey it's the little cosplaying bitch that cheap-shotted us last night... This makes for revenge, boys!" called the thug with the mo-hawk.

"Yeah, I think it's about time for a little payback. Don't you think so, boss?" the other thug, the one with the buzzcut addressed who seemed to be their leader; a teen sporting messy dark grey hair on a round head and round figure. Funnily enough, he was shorter than both of his comrades, and shorter than Maxi. He pulled out a piece of a pipe with a disgusting smirk. Maxi stood and stepped in front of the girl, ready to fight them if he had to. Maxi was no stranger to a brawl, he'd gotten into several on a weekly basis in school.

"Oooh," the leader taunted, "seems we got a brave boy, huh?" he flourished the pipe in his hand. "Let's see how far that attitude gets you, bub." Maxi very subtly leaned onto the mic of his headset and whispered to Felicia.

"Would you kindly place a pebble on my left foot, on my right foot, and in my left hand?" he asked. Felicia sighed on the other end.

"Pebbles? Really?" she asked, "if you would just use daggers, or even shurikens would do, if you would just use those like I asked-" he harshly indicated that now was not the time to argue. Felicia sighed. "Fine, here you go." With a bit of work from her teleportation module, there was now a pebble sitting on either of Maxi's shoes, and one concealed in his left palm.

"I'm going to offer you two options," Maxi told the thug, his tie flapping slightly in the wind. He was still in his suit from the meeting, so that would make this interesting. It was going to look like a scene from The Matrix. The girl behind him came to as he continued. "Option one, I kick your ass and throw you off the street. Option two, you turn around and walk away." The thug didn't seem to have bought his threat. Maxi sighed. As the mo-hawk charged at him, Maxi kicked him in the stomach with his right foot, the pebble taking to the air. He spun over and kicked the buzzcut in the face with his left foot, that pebble following suit. Both thugs stumbled back, and all three thugs charged at once now as the pebbles, and Maxi's plan, fell into place. Maxi flipped upwards, going airborne and spinning as the thugs came nearer. Maxi lashed out and kicked the first stone, then the second, then landing, giving a final spin, and throwing the last one with incredible force. The first rock knocked out the mo-hawk with a direct shot to the head. the second shot, knocked over the buzzcut with a shot in the leg. The third rock took the leader in the chest, knocking him onto his butt and pissing him off. "Bullseye." Even though he'd missed, this provided Maxi with all the time he needed to pick up the girl behind him, in a bridal style position, and take off.

Maxi paused in the middle of the field between his house and the city to catch his breath. In a surge of adrenaline, that run had taken him just over a minute, and his endurance had taken quite the blow for it. He checked on the girl in his arms, only noticing now that her eyes had opened. "Ah, good morning." he said to her, "Or I suppose it's afternoon now. You know what I meant." The girl pouted at this.

"I-idiot! What were you thinking?!" she yelped as her cheeks turned the same shade of red as her eyes. Maxi set the girl on her feet and took a bow. The girl wasn't sure how to respond, and Maxi assumed her face was turning red due to her fever, but the girl knew it was for a different reason.

"My apologies, milady, I simply didn't want to leave you as you were."

"It's not like I asked for your help or anything!" she finished her sentence with a huff, a half angry, half bashful look adorning her face.

"Is that so?" he asked, "Because yesterday when you turned around to look at me, you seemed like you wanted something. I suppose I should have introduced myself then, shouldn't I have? How rude of me." The girl was taken aback.

"You saw that?!" she asked in bewilderment, "I thought for sure I had... ah..." she stumbled over her words as she realized what that meant. That wasn't her original intention, but it made her flustered anyway. She quickly shook that off however, as she realized that Maxi had been looking forward the whole time yesterday, so it was physically impossible that he should have seen her. With no better questions coming to her mind, she asked the one that was most prominent. "Who ARE you?"

Maxi bowed again, sensing that the girl was very much one for formalities, "Maximillian Penumbra," he introduced himself, "Though please, call me by whatever name suits your fancy. Max and Maxi are the two most commonly used, though others..." he though about Neptune, "...prefer other names..." he quickly regained his composure, "and to whom do I have the pleasure of speaking?"

She looked at him, puzzled, before managing to formulate and answer. "-re..."

"Hm? My apologies, you'll have to excuse me, but my ears are not the best, I'm afraid I didn't catch that." he told her, unsure of what she'd mumbled a moment ago.

"My name..." she sheepishly answered, but it came clearly this time, her cheeks flushing red once more. "...is Noire."

* * *

 **So here we are at the end of the chapter and I've got a few things for you guys before we go.**

 **First thing, is developer commentary.  
So I did this chapter for immersion and did my best to let you get sucked into the story. An interesting idea, however, would be to include why I did certain things in brackets at certain points. If you guys would like developer commentary, let me know in the comments, and we'll give it a try for a chapter. If not, then also remember to get back to me on whether or not you guys liked the text going unmarked.**

 **Next thing is about this story's length.  
I don't plan for this story to be very long. I'd call twenty chapters tops. I plan to lead it into another story though, so catch up on my other story, Paradox, if you want to see where this could go!  
**

 **Final thing is about the other stuff I'm about to do.  
So I like playing lots of different games and writing lots of different materials. One of the fics I plan to write is a Fire Emblem; Birthright fic. If you'd like to check that one out as well, I would very much appreciate it, but if not, that's fine too. We're all into our separate stuff.**

 **So, now that I'm done talki- wait not I'm not.**

 **I didn't do dev commentary in chapter, so let me try and answer a few questions before they get asked.**

 **WHAT'S IN A NAME? - Felicia Penumbra  
I've already made it very clear that I'm a bit obsessed with the Fire Emblem games, and that Felicia is a combination of three people actually. The first, gives her the more feminine side, and that side comes from the actual in-game Felicia that serves as your maid in the new games of Fates. Felicia's blunt end comes from the widely disliked Sully character from Awakening. The most complaints I've heard with Sully are that she's not very useful since she's only an average character in a game full of characters that are so much better. The last, and perhaps most unlikely character that Felicia is based off of, is any Dalek you might encounter in Doctor Who. From such a creature, Felicia gets her more logical, sometimes even violent side, portrayed when she asks Maxi to use daggers or shurikens in place of stones. Each of Felicia's sides has a reason, here they are; Her ditzy maid side, implemented by Maxi, is because she is indeed a maid. This side is Felicia's base personality and serves to have her function as any other maid might, if a little clumsy at times. Her more blunt, and Sully ended side, actually comes from the way Maxi speaks. Because Felicia is a learning software, she learns how to address people by how they address her, and how they address other people. Because of Maxi's tendancy to be sarcastic, the things she learns from him give her the saucy tomboyish side. The Dalek side is a bit more complicated, and this comes from the fact that Felicia is, indeed, a machine. Although advanced, there are still some things that Felicia is incapable of understanding, such as the purpose behind sparing attackers, demonstrated by this chapter. Felicia's main goals are to learn and keep Maxi in check, but more over, her highest priority goal, and this one she actually gives herself, is to protect Maxi. Because she is not perfect, Felicia cannot understand why Max would want to spare anyone that would attack him; her logic merely dictates that you're giving them a chance to do it again. All three of these combined, Felicia almost becomes a partial Yandere, wanting to eliminate anyone who would threaten the master she loves so dearly. All four of those things considered, I went with Felicia because, 1. Daleks don't really have names, 2. the name Sully didn't seem to fit at the time, and 3. Naming her Ayane as a shrug towards Yandere Simulator didn't seem like a viable option when I started writing.**

 **WHAT'S IN A NAME? - Maximillian Penumbra  
Some names have a huge story behind them, like Felicia's name, while others are simply implemented for much easier reasons. Maxi could have been named three things, Mike Shadow (as a reference to his own game), Anubis Necrulai (A a reference to the god of death), or Maximillian Penumbra (as a variation of Mike Shadow). The first two names were later taken by other characters, and I like the name Maximillian, because I could call the character Maxi, like a friend.  
**

 **HOW ABOUT THAT SETTING? - The city and world of New Kory  
New Kory, and it's geography are loosely how I imagined the world to look like when reading the original NENENEP, with a house a ways from a town or a city, with some plains in between. The hillside is over on the east side of the City, with the House residing in the north, a desert-ish area to the south, and the oceans to the West and way over, far, far to the east on the other side of the hills.**

 **Now that that's out of the way...  
As always, I hope you have a lovely evening, and, be it here or elsewhere, I will see you in the next chapter. See ya!**


	3. The Green Girl and the Happiest Mask

**A/N: Hoo boy, do I have a LOTALOTALOT to tell you guys... Have a seat, we'll be here a while. If you don't care about all this, feel free to skip to the chapter, I won't try to stop you. So let's cover some things right off the bat.**

 **?:My god, your upload Schedule is terrible, isn't it?  
!:That's one way of phrasing it, though I can think of a few others. Then main reason for that, is how much I'm handling right now. I'm also working on my other fanfiction: Impending Future, over in the Fire Emblem section of the archive, at the same time. As such, I go back and forth between this and that, and that was was uploaded last. I plan to upload another chapter to that one later tonight, or sometime tomorrow if I can. We'll see just how productive Mr. 24 can be.**

 **?: Is this fiction just going to be exactly the same thing, just with Maxi inserted?  
!: No actually. I plan to diverge the stories completely around the next chapter, or the one after it. It even diverges a bit in this chapter. Also, if you haven't noticed, or are reading this in the future, the fiction has a shiny new title, so let's see how this works out.**

 **?: You are aware that the author is continuing the original story, yes? Doesn't that mean you should stop?  
Truthfully, and painfully, yes. It does mean I should stop. However, no. I'm not going to, and Yes, I was aware of this. Let's sort out some reasons. I'm not stopping this, because I've had a lot of people tell me they really like this new fiction, and I owe it to them to continue. Also, that's the same reason that the original author has for continuing his version, so go figure. Also, Mr. DxD gave me permission to do this, and he said it was okay that I continue. The author in the T-section he refers to in his explanation chapter is me. (Also, that's really cool to me...) So, yeah, this will keep going. If you don't like it, or you want me to get back to Paradox** **[** **yes, that story is not dead], don't worry, I plan for my verion to be twenty shorter chapters, absolute tops, so there's no need to worry if you don't like this one, or like the other one better. Who knows? Maybe they'll wind up as the same story? ;)**

 **?:You're stalling again.  
!: Yes I am. Get on with the chapter! I'll see ya in the end slate. Here's:  
**

 _ **The Puppet Master; chapter three: In which Maxi meets the Green Girl, and finds the Happiest of Masks.**_

* * *

Maxi paused, not knowing which to acknowledge first. What her name was, or the fact that she was really pretty? He decided to acknowledge the name first, not knowing how the second option would blow over. "Beg pardon..." he said stuttering for only a moment, "Your name is black?"

"Huh?! What do you mean?!" she seemed not to understand what her name meant. "I said my name was Noire!" she had sprung to her feet, temporarily ignoring her fever. Maxi didn't acknowledge that, but did acknowledge that he'd blipped on his attention span. Maxi knew several languages, ranging from German, to Irish, to Korean and Chinese, even to Arabic and Japanese, and finally French, English, and Spanish. With the degree he'd studied them too, they automatically translated to English in his head. Maxi shook his head, trying to phrase his next words carefully, his first line hadn't been the best. He waved a hand dismissively.

"My bad, translation errors, All you bases are belong to us, you know, that kinda thing." his tone was also extremely dismissive and, as such, Noire had no idea how to respond, and, as such, she didn't. Maxi giggled a bit to himself, noting how funny the situation was. In truth, Maxi was normally a sucker for a pretty girl but, now he had no problem talking to them. Between Neptune and Felicia, maybe he was getting better at this? They stood across each other, completely silent, until Noire coughed and dropped. He quickly rushed to her side. "Noire!" He managed to catch her before she hit the ground. He tried to think about what he could do here. He could call for Felicia's help, but he wasn't sure whether or not the teleportation module could move three people at once. He'd have to carry her back to the house as he'd done for Neptune before hand. "Eveything's okay, I'll take take care of you, I know someone who can help you real quick."

"Y-You... promise?" she asked, her eyes half closed, her face red. He nodded, a smile plastering across his face.

"By my honor, you have my word." he told her with a reassuring look. She almost smiled herself before her tsun-tsun engaged.

"D-Don't get the wrong idea!" she yelped, "I'm only putting my health in you're care for now! It's not like I want you to carry me or anything..." Maxi shook his head.

"Tsunderes." He said to himself, rolling his eyes. He then turned back to Noire. "Alright, I'll carry you there, okay?" he said this ignoring her previous remarked.

"I... um... I guess I wouldn't mind if you did, Max..."

Maxi got Noire into a bridal carry, and headed off towards his house. By this point, it wasn't far. He didn't even really feel impeded by carrying her. She was almost as light as Neptune was, and he'd run much farther distances, this didn't really bother him.

"Hey are you okay carrying me, Max? If you're getting tired I could walk...?"

"No, no, that's alright," he told her, "We don't want your fever getting worse, yeah?" Technically there was no logic behind this proposal. There was nothing that dictated she would get worse if she walked. Then again, Max didn't want her to overexert herself if she was sick.

"You're such an idiot." she retorted with a huff.

"That so? Well then, Lady Noire, you just got saved by an idiot. How's about that?" he shot back sarcastically.

She huffed in response, "Don't get too full of yourself, Max, after all, you're in the presence of a Go-deshj-...!" Noire quickly bit her tongue to cut herself off.

"Did you just bite your tongue? Awfully clumsy move for a goddess." he said with a sarcastic smirk.

"Oh... You heard that... um... just ignore what I said, that was... um... egotistical of me, sorry.." Noire's face reddened again but, Maxi ignored it. He simply laughed quietly to himself and nodded. Noire's mind wandered to other things, mainly when she was going to interrogate him. Suddenly, her eyelids began to droop. Interrogating him could wait, she was tired. She slowly dozed off in his arms, waiting to get there.

"Felicia? Would you kindly prepare another guest room? We're going to have more company when I get home." Felicia gave confirmation on the other end. After a while, he reached the doorstep. He slammed his face into the door and waited for someone to come answer it.

"Alright, Noire, here we... are?" Maxi looked down to Noire in his arms, a bit of a watery substance running down her cheek and onto his arm. He quietly chuckled at it, not at all disgusted by it. "What is it with girls deciding to take naps while I'm carrying them? Whatever. So that means Nep snores and Noire drools. How cute."

"Huh? What's cute?" The voice was airheaded in tone and playful at the same time. He looked up.

"Oh hey, Neptune." he said to the violet themed girl at the door. He had expected Felicia to answer it, but that worked too.

"Who's this chick?" she asked him, sporting a plain expression that didn't seem to go with her usual ditzy demeanor.

"Noire." The one word answer wasn't an optimal one but, as far as Maxi was concerned, he wasn't sure he cared much.

"Noire? Fancy name... bet she doesn't have any friends." she teased with a catty smile. Maxi frowned at her.

"Oh, be nice. She's some kind of sick, so I'm gonna take her inside... good thing I took care of that meeting already, I would've been hella late by now..." he looked one way down the hall, then the other. "Feliciaaaaa!" he called, "You got that room ready yet?" in response, the maid appeared just behind Neptune and bowed, beckoning Maxi to follow her. He did so. A few floors down, Felicia had prepared a room for Noire, and it seemed to match her style. Somehow Felicia always knew how to make people happy. She'd set up Neptune's room is a similarly perfect style with a light purple theme.

"Well, you don't have to worry about her now, darling, just leave her in your eternally cute soon to be lovers care! I'll make sure she's better in no time." Max turned around to look at her, Felicia following suit. Neither of them were sure how to respond to such a remark. They looked at Neptune, then at each other, then back at Neptune. Eventually Maxi spoke up.

"I don't understand how you can say such outlandish things with such a straight face. It makes it impossible for me to tell whether or not you're joking." It was true. Neptune could say the oddest of things without batting an eye, yet whenever she did so, she spoke with such conviction that he almost believed she wasn't joking. "All due respect, sweetheart," he said with a confident smile, "I think Felicia is a bit more equipped to handle such a task, but if you want to help, then that would be great too." his smile, combined with his comment, made Neptune blush just a little followed by a smile of her own this time it was a smile of sincerity. Felicia tapped his shoulder.

"Not to ruin your moment, sir, but we don't have any medipods. If you could go get me the things I need to make one, we'd have this done with significantly less consumption of time and energy." Maxi nodded.

"Then I'll get on that. Cover Felicia for anything else while I'm gone, honey?" he asked, addressing Neptune. She blushed, but gave him a goofy smile and a thumbs up, and with that, he was back out the door.

"I couldn't have just left her there... could I? Nah, then I'd never be able to live with myself... no way in hell I'll ever let anything bad happen to those two. Them and Felicia are really all I have..." He ran with his eyes closed, knowing the way well enough to do it blind. He talked to himself as he ran, keeping track of how much distance he'd covered when, all of a sudden, he sensed something ahead of him. "Shit! Watch out!" Maxi managed to make an extremely sharp curve in his run, narrowly avoiding someone in his way. However, he didn't execute the move flawlessly, and found himself tumbling across the ground. He picked himself up, dusting himself off as the person walked over to him.

"My apologies," the girl said, "I wasn't aware anyone would be running around quite to quickly as you were just now. Here, let me help you up." He took her hand, helping to pull himself up as he stood before her now. In front of him stood a mature looking girl, long, curled, light blond hair, long bangs neatly framing her face, and innocent looking blue eyes. She wore an emerald green dress adorned with gold markings. She had loose light green and white gloves on her hands, and along the top part of her skirt was a big peach/orange bow. Around her neck she wore a sort of white collar with green lining around the bottom, and a very thin white cloth connecting the dress and neck piece together. At the center was a gold circular piece, with a small blue gem in the center, and a tiny red ribbon with gold in the center. Maxi brushed himself off, ignoring her overly suggestive chest.

"I'll admit, I'm probably the only one who would be doing so. My apologies for disturbing your walk." he responded with the utmost respect. He had learned to respond in this manner to strangers in order to avoid most conflicts. It had been different with Noire and Neptune because he hadn't been thinking about it but, Maxi was half Italian. The general rule for Italians, was that you were polite to people you didn't like or just met but, if you were friends, or someone else gave the all clear, or even just started it first, some joking around and teasing was only customary.

"Well, that's okay," she responded, "Maybe you could pay me back with your name?" Maxi was slightly dodgy to such a simple repayment but, if that's all she wanted, then he wouldn't withhold such information.

"My name?" he clarified, "Maximillian Penumbra. Feel free to use a nickname. The full version is a bit of a mouthful, yes?" he offered.

"Maxi, then?" he nodded, "Hmhm, such a cute name for such a cute boy." she gave a smile that made him even more uncomfortable with this situation, if that was even possible.

"If you say so?" he half-asked, half-responded, "I suppose I've never checked, myself."

"Well, my name is Vert," green? "you have my full attention now, why don't we talk?" she asked walking closer to him, and reaching out to raise his head up to be level with hers, but he recoiled and kept his eyes on her.

"Yeah, no." he shot back, an extremely distrusting look on his face, "I hate to be rude but, I was running for a reason. I'd like to get back to that. This is a small city, I'm sure I'll see you again, we'll talk then." and with that, he dodged around her and took off again towards the medical shop.

Now that he'd acquired all he needed, he was heading back towards his house when he saw Vert, still sitting on a bench, right by the spot he'd first met her in. "Maxi!" she called to him. He had half a mind to keep running, but she'd obviously waited quite a while so the least he could do was acknowledge it.

"Don't tell me you waited for me all this time?" he asked.

"Yes I did and, I think we got off on the wrong foot, here." she replied. He recoiled slightly at such a remark. It was sort of true, he had taken a disliking to her as soon as he'd met her, but only due to the way she'd acted. He supposed that it was worth a try to get back on track but, he needed to deliver these things to Felicia to aid in Noire's recovery.

"I suppose we did," he shot back, "What did you have in mind?"

"I understand you're in a hurry. How about we exchange e-mails and talk later?

This only made Maxi more dodgy but, as t was before, if that was all she wanted, "With me, though? Why, though?"

"Well, I'd like to think of us as friends. Exchanging emails between friends is a normal occurrence, yes?"

"I suppose..." Maxi didn't have anything to counter that, "I don't suppose you have a pen and pencil, do you?"

"No but, we can use this device that I acquired from working at this cute little store that sells electronic devices." she said. Maxi decided not to question her wording. "I believe you people call it a U-phone?"

"You people...?"Maxi decided not to question her wording for a second time. That aside, a smartphone was a perfect place to store an email, even if Maxi was reluctant to give it to her, "alrighty then, here you go..." Max finally gave in, he needed to get back to the house and fix the situation, fast.

"There," Vert noted complacently, "Now we're email friends as well." she said contented smile and a light giggle.

"Looks like it, I guess." he responded, really wanting to hurry back, "Well then, Vert, as lovely as this is, I need to head out."

"Oh? What's the rush?" she asked with a look of disappointment at the sight of him beginning to walk away. After a momentary consideration, Maxi decided to tell the truth. It was the best reason for leaving.

"There's someone that's sick at my place, and I need to bring them this stuff before they get any worse." he said, his voice flat, his face dull.

"My my, how unfortunate." Vert replied, closing her eyes and sighing, "Then, I suppose you have needs to attend to. Feel free to email me whenever, Maxi." She walked over to him and gently kissed his cheek. Maxi ignored and and turned the other way and began to walk off. He didn't mean to come off as rude, he just really needed to get the supply kit to Felicia so she could heal Noire with it.

"Yeah yeah, I'll probably do that... I dunno, I'll get back to you on it." he replied dismissively. Vert turned and proceeded to walk away as well, wondering if this was the right person to help her.

(Line)

Maxi finally arrived back at the house, carrying the box of supplies. He burst into the room with the box in hand. Felicia turned to him with a finger at her lips. He stopped dead in the middle of the room, narrowly avoiding falling to the floor. He handed her the box, and she took it, then shook her head.

"We didn't even need this. She's not sick." Felicia told him. Maxi made a face.

"Fuck do you mean she's not sick?!" he blurted out as quietly as he could, "She had a crazy fever like, thirty minutes ago!" Felicia shook her head again.

"I ran a medical scan, she's just extremely tired." Felicia reported, "Sure, she could use a meal and a few glasses of hydration, but that will have to wait until the rest issue is rectified." Maxi fell over backwards, face-palming at the same time. Felicia quickly reached out and grabbed the box before he dropped to the floor with it.

"Why couldn't we have done this BEFORE I went out and grabbed all this stuff?" Felicia held up one hand.

"Well, there IS something ELSE concerning." Maxi picked his head up to look at her, "Noire was carrying this earlier. It struck me as particularly having a particularly negative demeanor, so I removed it from her inventory. When I did so, her condition rapidly began to recover. Maybe you should hang onto it, Sir?" Maxi stood up and looked at the thing in Felicia's grip. It was a mask, and it was perfectly sized to his face. He looked at the front of it to see if there were any designs. The mask seemed to be in similar design to the anonymous mask, simply lacking the facial hair designs, and having a slightly more open mouth. However, the mask seemed to have some concerning red designs leaking from the eyes and right corner of the mouth. He took it from Felicia and held it up to the light to examine it better. What were those designs? Paint? Whatever. Suddenly, words echoed through Maxi's head as he looked at it.

'Yes, yes! This is absolutely great! It's a dream come true, and I'm SO glad I followed my dream... Just... I love you... tell Mom too, tell her I- Wait... Wait! Wait! I'm happy! I'M HAPPY! SEE?! LOOK AT MY SMILE, HAH... PLEASE! I SAID I'M HAPPY! PLEASE DON'T-!' the words abruptly cut off in his head. Maxi stood completely still, staring into the mask's eyes until he suddenly dropped to the floor, shaking uncontrollably. That mask made him extremely unnerved. It bothered him more than he though it possible to be bothered. Normally, he could conceal any emotions he had, but that mask... it scared him. That mask was one that had seen too much, one that shouldn't be entrusted to anyone. Why was Noire, of all people, carrying such a thing? Felicia picked him up and held him close to her, trying to calm his shaking. After a while, it subsided, and Maxi could finally consider himself, semi- at-peace again. That mask was still unnerving as all buggery, and Gods only knew what it was hiding. All he knew about it, was that he had to keep it away from falling into the wrong hands. He set it aside, in another room, for safe keeping. Felicia took him by his shoulders and looked into his eyes.

"What was that all about?" she asked him. "Are you okay now? Please, tell me if anything ails you, Maxi..." Maxi managed a weak grin and raised a hand in assurance. Felicia sighed in relief and crushed him up against herself in an embrace. "Please don't do that again!" she half cried, "Please, Maxi... you're all I have... Don't scare me like that!" Maxi nodded, his breathing still very slightly ragged. Maxi could suddenly hear a voice in his head. He didn't know who it was.

'Don't worry, I'm still watching. I'm watching everyone... Don't worry, Maxi... I'll keep them safe." Somehow, he knew it was the mask. The voice just seemed to correlate to it somehow. Even though the mask itself unnerved the hell out of him, it's voice seemed soothing. 'Just call me Myous.' it told him, 'I'm always listening too, so just tell me if you need anything...' Myous' voice trailed off as it finished his sentence. Maxi didn't understand. Somehow, the mask had gone from unnecessarily unnerving, to super soothing in the course of a few minutes, only by the action of a few words. He sighed. 'Oh, and that Vert lady? You can trust her too. Stop being so rude to her, you might hurt her feelings. You want to keep her... Happy... right? I know you do. She needs your help, you know. She hasn't asked for it yet but, she's lost something that she can't get back. We're just going to have to help her.' Maxi slightly nodded to this, 'Good. I'll show you what we can do together later. For now, I think you're tired. Get some sleep why don'tcha?' Maxi sighed and smiled at Felicia.

"Thanks for lookin' out for me, Felicia. I don't know what I would do without you." He gave her a hug. "Now then, I think I'm gonna get to bed. I guess Neptune's already asleep?" Felicia nodded.

"After I told her about Noire, she hurried to bed to avoid such herself." Maxi chuckled lightly. "Alright then, good night, Maxi." Maxi turned and headed off to his room, a light blush on his face. That was the first time that Felicia had actually called him Maxi instead of sir. He quite liked the change, he felt like it made the two of them closer. He liked the idea of being closer to his friends, especially Felicia, Neptune, and Noire. Maybe he could even get closer to Vert one day, and then he could make even more friends? That sounded like a good plan, after all, Myous had said that Vert was trustworthy, so why not?

Maxi stretched and gave a loud yawn as he closed his door behind him and flopped into bed. 'Tomorrow, Maxi...' he thought to himself, 'tomorrow is another day.'

* * *

 **OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH BOY! How many of you saw THAT one coming?! Oh you did see it coming? Aight den... Nonetheless, let's roll with some end-slate funfacts and trivia.**

 **WHAT'S IN A NAME? - Myous  
Kay first off, how does one pronounce Myous' name to begin with, you ask? It's pronounced My-Us. And why'd I choose that as his name? I'll be honest, this one was a bit of a snap decision. Myous, is a combination of the last few letters in anonymous. Named after the mask that he looks like(yes, Myous is a guy(wow! an HDN character that isn't a girl! (Psyche naw. that's totally an OC (if you want to call it that) right there) I'm just kidding about that by the way...) or maybe he doesn't have a gender? (Are we really going into the specifics of genders and sex and all that shit right now? (Wait hold on, how many f***ing layers of parenthesis is this?)) I dunno, I'll work it out *cues Jerk it Out by Caesars* Well, not what I meant, but aight then?) Myous is a magic mask that possesses the ability to absorb, copy, and retain energy from foes that he's either fighting or fought before. As such, he can create spiritual 'puppets' that follow either his command, or his wearer's. Myous is indeed a mask, and has very little means of moving on his own, and has power to drawn on from his own but, needs a wearer to function properly. Unlike what you might be thinking, Myous has absolutely no negative effects on the wearer at all, and has no intent on hurting people. The voice that emanates from him and gives the horror-like scene at the beginning is the echo of the person who was murdered by the serial killer who wore Myous first. Said person's souls possessed the mask, and gave it the power it has, turning it into Myous.**

 **WHAT'S IN A NAME - The Puppet Master  
Here's the new title of the book! And... Well... This one will explain itself after a while. Though, if you pieced together than Maxi is going to be Myous' new wearer, then maybe it'll start making sense? Also, think about the fact that he's already got Felicia, so what's stopping him from making other similar robotic/puppet units?**

 **DESIGN CHOICES - RUDE BASTARD, MUCH?  
Normally I would insert an excerpt, but this covers like... a LOT of the chapter. That aside, I received a lot of questions about why Maxi is rude, or extremely distrusting of Vert, yet is totally fine with an unnerving mask. The real reason is that the person that Maxi is based off of really did not like Vert at first, so that was a nod to him. If you're reading, buddy, you know who you are.**

 **That's about all for this chapter. And as always, feel free to comment, ask questions, and leave suggestions in the comment section included. Thanks for reading. Let's do this outro.**

 **So then, as always, I hope you all have a lovely evening, and, be it here or anywhere elsewhere, may we meet again upon another chapter. See ya!**


	4. The Brother and The Librarian

**A/n: Do I have anything to say in this intro? Nope. This chapter has taken long enough. Let's just get to the point, so here's:**

 _ **Chapter Four: In Which We Meet Maxi's Brother and Learn of the Librarian of White**_

 **Let's get started.**

* * *

Maxi woke up to the smell of smoke. He sprang out of bed, located the source, and dashed into the kitchen where a flame had broken out. He elbowed the fire system on the wall, causing sprinklers to douse the room, getting him, Neptune, and Noire very wet. His hair now down in his eyes, he walked over to the two of them.

"Yikes!"

"EEP!"

The two girls yelped, afraid of what came next, noting that Maxi seemed rather tired still. "Can I ask exactly what happened?" he asked, his tone not carrying anything behind it except for exceptional drowsiness. "What were you two doing?" Before either of them could explain, Maxi poked Noire in the forehead.

"Whaaaa..." Noire wasn't exactly sure how to respond to such a gesture other than her face turning furiously red. She wasn't even entirely sure why he'd done so. The whole thing seemed to be just for the purpose of flustering her.

"Oh good, your fever's resided. Glad you're feeling better." Or maybe that was a thing as well? Ignoring that, Neptune spoke up, needing to add her own two cents.

"Well, she got better this morning, so we've just been chilling and stuff." Neptune said nonchalantly.

"Chilling, huh?" he asked, his usual repertoire of vocabulary unavailable due to his lack of energy. He pushed a button on the wall and spoke drowsy words into the panel. "Felicia, can I have some help in the kitchen? I spilled some water..." he said.

"Be down there as soon as I'm done recharging, Maxi" She replied. Maxi sauntered over to the fridge and pulled out a few cups and a carton with a panel on it.

"So then..." he headbutted the panel and the carton changed color, pouring coffee into the mug in his hand. He took a sip of the coffee before headbutting it again. This time, the carton changed to white before now pouring milk out into the mug. As a finisher, a small sugar cube dispensed itself from the carton as well, completing his coffee with a bit of sweetness. "How did the fire get started?" He seemed to be ignoring the fact that all three of them were sopping wet. That is until he noticed that both Neptune and Noire were inspecting their clothes. "Oh okay, hold on..." he leaned his head against the panel on the wall, placing the carton on the counter. "Felicia, if you could bring us all a change of clothes that would be wonderful..."

"Whatever for, Maxi?" Felicia asked. "I thought you just spilled some water?" Maxi took a moment to contemplate his answer.

"Well I did, I just spilled it from the ceiling by pushing a button." Felicia took a bit of a suspicious tone on the other end.

"Do you mean you activated the fire alarm?" she asked. When Maxi didn't answer, she took it as a yes. "Why did you trigger the fire alarm?"

"Reasons."

Felicia sighed on the other end. "I'll bring clothes down with me and, I want an explanation when I do." she said.

"Aight, suuuure..." he said. To be honest, it looked like Maxi was on so many drugs that he was higher than the ceiling but, he was, indeed, completely clean. Matter of fact, Maxi had never once used any kind of drug, and never planned to. He was just always like this when he was tired. "So then... talk to me..." Neptune obliged to an explanation.

"Weeell... to make a long story short, we kind of sorta, accidentally started a fire. We were trying to make breakfast." she said with the most casual tone, followed by an innocent smile and a round of quiet "haha's"

"Neptune!" Noire elbowed Neptune slightly in the side of her ribs, likely trying to shut her up out of embarrassment. Neptune gave a small bit of a yelp but, otherwise obliged to silence. Noire panicked in her mind as she thought of what Maxi could do next. To her surprise, he gave a dismissive wave of his hand.

"It's whatever... I mean... you know, so long as you guys are alright..." he said, his voice still clouded by the reaches of sleep. He took another swig of coffee. Noire, on the other hand, couldn't believe her ears. Max was, somehow, more worried about their well being than the state of his own house. "Really, the house coulda burnt down... so long as no one got hurt... I've got more places to go... It's not big deal..." such an attitude may have seemed foolish to some, and it could be considered as flawed, but Maxi was tired, and, as such, didn't really care.

"Aw, my darling's such a sweetheart!" Neptune tackled him, knocking him to the floor, Laying on top of him. "Methinks I was right to call you darling. Hehe~..." Maxi simply responded by hugging back, mostly being too tired to do much of anything else. Neptune couldn't help herself anymore, she'd gotten such a strong urge to show him some form of affection, and this was how the kettle boiled over. Both of them seemed to be mostly enjoying it. Noire simply stood in place, a blank stare on her face wondering just who this boy was. She had never met, or even heard of, someone so peculiarly stupid, yet somehow, she thought it was a good kind of stupid. Not that that made any sense, and not that she cared or anything. "All of us came out in one piece, so all is good, right darling?" Neptune looked at Maxi who responded with a gentle nod. "Let's just go back to making breakfast, then!" Maxi stopped her.

"Let's not set the house on fire again if we don't have to." he said, "Let's just wait for Felicia to-" The maid blipped into the room in a burst of energy. "Oh right, teleportation..."

"Explanation." Felicia said quickly, "Now."

"Cooking accident." he responded.

"Why were you trying to cook? I always handle that for you." she asked.

"Reasons."

"This is NOT Game Theory!" she shouted.

"Fine, no reason then." he quickly retorted.

"Then why is Neptune on top of you? Surely that has a reason?"

"Nope." Maxi popped the 'p' in the word, making sure that Felicia was thoroughly confused.

"Uh... okay?" Mission accomplished. Maxi eased himself off the floor. "I'll handle making the eggs, toast some bread for me?" he looked at her, his eyes still clouded. Felicia iced her hand and smacked him across the face. Somehow, he ignored such a strike and lolled over to the toaster, Neptune still attached to him. Before he could do anything there, Felicia quickly grabbed him and pulled him away. He looked at her, with sleep ridden eyes. She escorted him to the bathroom where she promptly handed him some dry clothes. "Try not to electrocute yourself, Maxi." she said before heading back out. She handed fresh sets of clothing to the girls, identical to what they were currently wearing, minus the water.

"Why does Maxi have clothes like this lying around?" Noire asked, a bit wary. Felicia shook her head.

"He doesn't, I threw these together just earlier. Because of how quickly my fingers can move, and my ability to utilize short and long distance teleportation, Sewing articles of clothing takes only a matter of minutes for me." she explained. Neptune nodded acceptingly and took her clothes and headed off to change, Noire following suit later.

Back in the kitchen a while later, this time a bit more awake, Maxi stuck a few pieces of homemade bread into the slots of the toaster. He preferred this old fashioned toaster because he found it entertaining how the toast came flying out when it was done. He'd even made the springs of the toaster more resilient such that the toast sprang out even more vehemently, usually onto a plate. With Felicia and Maxi working together, it wasn't long before breakfast was ready. After a very quiet breakfast due to everyone being busy stuffing their faces, everyone was thoroughly full. They decided to move over to the living room to relax. Neptune laid back, leaning on Maxi's shoulder.

"Ahh..." she let out a contented sigh, "this place really is just like home..." she nuzzled up against his shoulder as she eased back. "We've got a comfy couch, lots of games to play, and tons of pudding..." she smiled at Maxi, "...and now we've got friends to share it with!" Maxi smiled back, fully awake now, but contentedly comfortable.

"Yes," he sighed, "what more could one ask for?"

"Home... huh?" Noire was sitting nearby, the gloom audible in her voice. Maxi looked over at her.

"What's wrong, Noire?" he asked her. She looked over at him, slightly surprised that he'd heard the comment. "Do you not have a place to go?" Noire opened her mouth, unsure of what to say. Was that it? Did she have to come clean now? Suddenly, Neptune's outgoing randomness saved her.

"Hey! Are you a fellow amnesiac?!" she blurted out. Maxi covered his ear slightly, trying to let the ringing die down.

"Yes!" Noire almost shouted, "That's right, amnesia. I can't remember a single thing!" Maxi knew that was probably bullshit, but Noire didn't strike him as the kind of person to lie without a good reason, so he simply went with it.

"Uh-huh..." he confirmed closing his eyes. "Well, the police is an option, though not one I've found to be very helpful with such situations..." that wasn't the truth, the police would probably be the most helpful, but Noire seemed too full of pride to want to go to them. To prove his point, she nodded quickly. "Well, your room's already set up. Feel free to stay here as long as you like. With you and Neptune around, it just means I've got more people to share the space with. Who knows? Maybe my house will finally start to feel like the right size."

Noire was startled at his proposition, but it sort of made her happy that he'd offer. It saved her a lot of trouble too besides... what was the harm in hanging around him a little longer... right? Neptune put one finger on her bottom lip. I think that's a good plan." Neptune said with a confident nod and a smile, "Just so long as she doesn't get any ideas involving you, darling." Her tone seemed to be one of marking her territory, but Maxi defused such with a bit of a laugh.

"Really? That's how far your taking this now?" he asked her. She ignored his comment and turned to Noire.

"Sorry No-wah but, I've called dibs on darling since day one." she said with a smirk, "Aaaah... I remember it like it was yesterday..."

Maxi paused for a moment. "You know... it was like... two days ago. You do realize that, yes?" she looked at him, her eyes slightly narrowed.

"Blegh." she said sticking her tongue out. Maxi giggled a bit at the gesture. "Details and junk, darling. I don't need 'em." she turned back to Noire, an interesting look on her face. "Point is, Noire, I ain't the kind to share. Guess you'll have to look elsewhere, huh?" she said with the same catty smile as before.

"Wh-why you!" Noire looked slightly irritated only proving Neptune's point further.

"Alright, then that's how it is, Noire!" Neptune called, "We may be fellow amnesiacs, but now we're love rivals too!" Maxi just shook his head and got up.

"Alright, we'll as much as I'd LOVE to continue this riveting chat, there are some things I'd like to get done today, so buh-bye." he looked back at the two girls, a sarcastic and cocky smile about his face. "Also, technically Felicia has been with me WAY before either of you came along. Just noting." He nudged Felicia's shoulder and the two winked to the girls before exiting the room. Neptune turned to Noire.

"I've got my eye on you, No-wah..." Noire huffed and threw her arms in the air.

"It's NOIRE, Neptune! N-O-I-R-E! NOIRE!" she practically screeched.

* * *

The day followed as it normally would have for Maxi, checking his various e-mails, writing out commands for his multiple scripts, providing good recommendation letters for some of his previous employees... "Oh hey, lookit dat..." he clicked on an e-mail from Jay Artamiel Den. This was a previous worker of his, one with a good work ethic, and a very keen eye for detail, as well as a good handle on the quality of the products he turned out. Currently handling a company called Avenir in... somewhere... (Jay never provided details) Jay was looking for a recommendation letter to join the company. "So I just have to e-mail this 'Mr. Singe' guy? sure, Jay, I can do that for you." he wrote out a keen recommendation, being sure to left out the time when he and Jay had almost invented time-travel, and sent it to the president. It looked like Jay was going to have a good time with this company, after all, Avenir, in French, meant to come up. Hopefully that meant good things for Jay in his endeavors to rise through the ranks and make his living. If not, then maybe he'd have another house guest soon, who knows? He didn't care at the moment. He went back to the other things he wanted to get done.

Writing his stories, responding to comments, averaging in influences from PMing and Commenting requests... "Ooooooh!" he exclaimed at a request. "Mr. DxD is continuing his stories. That's pretty neat." One of his favorite authors had re-continued a story he was reading. Lovely. As he continued, he had to put up with several antics from the other three, including a contest to see who could make him blush first (which nobody one), asking him who he liked better (to which no response was given), and even asking what he wanted for lunch. He turned to them. "Before I answer this question, who's making the dish?" He asked. All three girls spoke up at once, so he cut them all off. "Alright, then I'll make lunch. Felicia, cover this for me?" she hopped on the computer and began to issue out the commands for his scripts to keep his stocks in check and his machines with fresh orders. "Neptune, turn on the bread machine?" Neptune scurried off down the hallway towards the kitchen. "and Noire?" she turned to him, "Just stand right there and keep lookin' beautiful." he winked to her and left the room as her face turned excessively red. As soon as he left the room, he immediately regretted not turning down the modulator on his ears. He'd basically given himself a hearing aid through the use of a modulator on his headphones, such that he could hear what the girls were saying the first time, but it had a volume adjuster to keep from going deaf entirely. He should have turned it down when leaving the room, but it didn't occur to him until...

"MAXIMILLIAAAAAAAAAAAN!" Noire's voice, six o'clock. Maxi took off down the hallway, pulling off the sharpest turns you'd ever see. Noire was right on his heels, and somehow gaining quickly. Reaching the end of a corridor, Maxi turned on a dime and ran right past Noire, turning again, running up the wall, then jumping over her, off the wall, rolling on the landing, continuing down the hall, right into the elevator. Noire caught up to him and barely made the elevator with him as it started to descend.

 **[Cue elevator music]**

Noire and Maxi stood side by side, utterly silent. Noire tapped her foot. Maxi checked his watch. Felicia combed Maxi's hair back into place and redid Noire's twin-tails in order to fix the mess that both of them had become from such an ordeal.

 **[Music cuts out, doors open]**

Maxi bolted out the doors the moment they were open, Noire right behind him. Running up and down the corridors, and occasionally vaulting through windows managed to keep Maxi ahead of Noire. She didn't seem to be capable of jumping through open windows, nor could she run up walls the way he'd down so prior. It helped that his shoes were gravity bound, making it easier to maintain his balance on the floor, and even making it possible to run, literally, around rooms, floor to ceiling, with enough speed. After a while, Maxi remembered that he was supposed to be making lunch. He rushed up the halls, narrowly avoiding running into Neptune from behind. When Noire ran past Neptune as well, Neptune threw her arms in the air exclaiming:

"Hey! NO FAIR! I wanna play too!" And with that, both girls chased Maxi up and down the hallways for the next thirty minutes, until Neptune and Noire were out of stamina. He ran back to them. "No fair... you must have, like... infinite stamina or something..."

Maxi checked his watch screen, displaying that his stamina was only half-way down. He'd been training since the day he'd gone after Neptune, and it must have payed off. "Lol, maybe tho." he picked the two off the floor and set them on chairs in the dining room, then went off into the kitchen to get on what he was doing. A few minutes later, he was back out. At sometime or another, Felicia had started serving drinks with the Custom-Carton that Maxi had used for coffee before. He placed two platters on the center of the table. "Okay, so we've got four options. You got avocado toast with salt and pepper here," he pointed at a set of sandwiches, "you got some grilled cheese here." he pointed to another set, "here're some toasted ham sandwiches" another one, "and here's a set of sandwiches with avocado, ham, and cheese, toasted." he gestured to the last set. "Have as many as you want, I can always make more, and there's plenty here. Neptune grabbed a ham sandwich, Felicia a grilled cheese, Noire an avocado toast, and Maxi one of the everythings. After all of them were thoroughly stuffed, Maxi wrapped up the leftovers. Alright, I'm gonna be bringing these to the factory and offices to see if anyone needs lunch. You gonna tag along with me, Felica?" she bowed and nodded at the same time. "You guys wanna come?" he asked the other two girls.

Noire shrugged. "I think I'll stay behind. I'm kind of tired from all that food." Maxi chuckled. That was understandable.

"Well if Noire's staying behind, I don't trust her without Felly or Me watching her..." he turned to Felicia with the silent question of 'she calls you that?' to which Felicia simply nodded. With that, he turned and walked out the door.

"See you guys later!" Neptune ran up to him.

"Didn't you say you were gonna show us around?" Neptune asked. Suddenly he felt a twinge of guilt. He DID say that. He hadn't gotten a chance to do so yesterday. He gave her a smile over his shoulder.

"That I did. Thank you for reminding me. The weekend is coming up. Don't let me forget, okay?" he replied. Neptune nodded earnestly and Maxi walked off with Felicia, onward towards the workplace. It didn't take very long to get there. Felicia had offered to teleport them there but, Maxi had decided that he preferred to walk. When he got there, everyone was hard at work and some of his employees smiled when they saw him, bidding him good afternoon, asking how he was doing. He made sure to talk to every last one who did so, and by the time he got to the middle of the office, a half an hour had already passed. He laid the sandwiches on the table and opened up the container. "Anyone hungry?" he asked. "Take a break, I'm sure you all deserve it. Have some food, it'll do you good." And so he and Felicia talked to the employees for a while, asking how their lives were, and generally being friendly. Maxi knew that the key to leading any group of people was making yourself known to them. It was hard to have loyalty to some random overhead figure you never saw. Suddenly, one of his employees approached him, holding something in his hand. He smiled when he saw who it was. Kurolipan Penumbra, one of his employees that had kind of hired himself. He just showed up one day, took an empty cubicle, and started working. At some point or another, Maxi had started giving him a paycheck for his work and made him the Chief Information Technology Officer. It was interesting. Maxi knew he had no brothers, but Kurolipan, or as he preferred, Kupo, both had the same last name, and even looked rather similar to Maxi. They had the same basic build, the same shape of eyes, the same widow's peak, the same slant on their nose, and same skin tone. Not just a similar skin tone, but EXACTLY the SAME. As a joke once, they'd gotten a blood test, just to show, sarcastically, that they couldn't be brothers. The problem was, they had the same blood type, O negative, and their DNA actually made them look like brothers. They even acted like brothers sometimes. Matter of fact, Kupo had moved into the house after Maxi had offered. He just lived on the higher floors, so he and Maxi hadn't seen each other around the house as of lately. With their recent schedule changes, however, that was about to change. Enough backstory, now more on Kurolipan.

Kupo was an interesting kid. With dark- almost black- blue hair in the same style of Maxi's, and a similar face, yet just with different colored eyes, Maxi having red, Kupo having yellow, they looked like palette swaps of each other. Kupo didn't have Maxi's same skill with his hands, yet he did have more finesse with more combat oriented technology, which is why he came to Maxi today. "Hey bro, check this out." he handed Maxi something that looked like a contact. "Think of it like a tech glass thing, except I oriented the tech into a contact lens. Pretty neat, huh? I've got two right now. One for you, that you're holding now, and one for me, I've got it in." He looked at Maxi and his eye colour subtly changed, then changed back. "You've played games where you can lock on, right?" Maxi nodded in response, "Yeah. This thing gives you a tech interface and communicate with your mind. Then you can lock onto stuff and it'll even highlight important stuff for you. Here, you can even see if someone else is locked on, their eyes'll do this." His eyes, both of them, suddenly doubled, maybe even tripled, in intensity. It was somehow both very subtle, yet extremely noticeable to anyone who was paying attention. "Just keep it on the down-low, yeah? I'm not quite done finalizing them yet, not to mention, even when I do, I don't plan to distribute them. Just among us, you know?" Maxi understood.

"Sure. And thanks, Kupo. Howsabout we walk home together?" Kupo nodded and grabbed his case, packing it into a bag. Slinging the bag over his shoulder, Kupo stood and walked back over to Maci and Felicia. "Let's get going then." He turned to the people eating the sandwiches. He tapped an employee on the shoulder, he turned to face Maxi, "Oh hey, Joe. I'm gonna head home, just do me a favor and wrap the leftovers up when everyone's done eating? Just put it in the fridge, we'll keep it around in case anyone forgets lunch or needs a snack." Joe nodded and made sure to note this for later action. With that taken care of, Maxi patted Kupo on the shoulder and they saw themselves out with Felicia close behind.

* * *

"So... how many people are in the house now?" Kupo asked. Maxi had begun to explain what had happened over the past two or three days.

"There's you and I, that's two. There's Felicia, that's three, and then there's our two new residents, Neptune and Noire, so that's five." Maxi said. "Who knows? At this rate, we might actually use all the rooms I built in the house." Kupo looked at him.

"Like hell we will. Your house makes some hotels look small, Maxi." he said bluntly, "We would need a force of battalions and armies to fill your damn house."

"Ha ha..." Maxi quietly laughed, "I suppose we woooould...?" he trailed off the last word as his new contact lens locked onto something on a bench. He walked over to it, Kupo and Felicia on his heels. He picked it up, examining it. "A wallet..." he noted, "And it's full."

"It's full? How much money is in there?" Kupo inquired.

"Quite a lot by the looks of it, but there's one thing." Kupo raised an eyebrow, Felicia following suit. "This currency isn't one that I recognize."

"That's not possible, Maxi" Felicia intervened, "You recognize all currencies used in this entire world, do you not?" Maxi turned to her.

"That I do, so either this is just play money..." He took a moment to assess whether or not this should be possible. "Or what we've got here is from another world." He looked at the name. "White- er... Blanc Whiteheart. Blanc Whiteheart... That's- ah." He looked at Felicia. "It's just like Noire. Maybe she might know something about this?" Kupo looked at him.

"Have you got time?" he asked, "I think we should return the wallet first, and ask questions when we get there." Maxi opened his mouth to speak, but simply nodded in agreement.

"You're right." he turned to Felicia, "Head back and tell the other two I'll be home a bit late and why so, would you kindly? Oh, and take Kupo with you, I'm quite capable of returning a lady's wallet on my own." Kupo chuckled a bit.

"Ladies' man." He walked over and offered his hand to Felicia. She took it and teleported the both of them out. Maxi looked through the cards, scanning each one with his new lens. He was looking for any means of tracking the girl down to return the wallet. Noire had been strictly against going to the police, to the point where she'd pretended to be an amnesiac, yet strongly suggested against it. This girl had a similar name, and that was Maxi's only judgement point, so he assumed that should be a last resort.

"So you're a librarian?" he said to the girl in the picture. "That can't be right, I've been in the library so many damn times and I've never seen you once... The librarian's name is Camilla, not Blanc..." he scratched his chin lightly before setting off towards the library. "Blanc Whiteheart... just who are you?"

* * *

 **So, just a few quick things before we close out the chapter:**

 **WHAT'S IN A NAME? - Kurolipan Penumbra  
Kurolipan, shortened to Kupo, appears to be Maxi's brother, which is confusing as all buggery, and, yes, it's supposed to be. Kupo get's his name from my favortie game dev of all time, being something of a mix between his two characters Lance and Matt. If you don't know who I'm talking about, refer to Kupo777 on deviantart, elsewise known as Matthew Rozak, the creator of the Epic Battle Fantasy Series, as well as the Bullet Heaven Series. Kupo will sort of explain himself in later chapters, and if that's not enough, just let me know and I'll revisit him in another end slate.**

 **WHAT'S IN A NAME? - Camilla the Librarian  
Yeah, this was a total snap decision. First name that came to my head that sounded like it might belong to a librarian type deal person. Someone actually asked me about this, it's the only reason I put it here.**

 **WHAT'S IN A NAME? - Joe the Employee  
Also a snap decision, and if I was going to cover Camilla, I had to cover Joe. It would only be fair, I guess...?**

 **DESIGN CHOICES - "** **he clicked on an e-mail from Jay Artamiel Den."  
I'll leave this one to a simple quote from a pre-reader of mine. "Hm... That names seems familiar for some reason? I don't suppose you jumbled someone else's name, did you?" Hm... indeed. Maybe I did?**

 **And that's all I've got for this end-slate, so let's do this outro.**

 **As always, I hope you all have a lovely evening, and, be it here or anywhere elsewhere, may we meet again upon another chapter. See ya!**


	5. The Lawnfront Brawl

**A/N: So... I don't even really have an intro... or an author's note for this one...? I guess it's taken a little longer than it should have because I just recently got a PSVita, and a whole bunch of new games, literally, as I'm writing this, steam just popped up and told me that Magicka 2 has finished downloading. Beofre anyone gets on me for buying a PS Vita, and spouting shit about the console wars, to be fair, Microsoft hasn't made a portable console yet, and, also to be fair, I also have an Xbox One, so... maybe that makes me a double agent? Fuck it. I don't even care anymore. Rage if you want to, that's what freedom of speech is for. Matter of fact? Let's actually debate this, maybe not here, in the comment section, I'll see if I can open up a forum, someone just tell me to do so if that's an actual good idea (it's prolly not tho) and we'll debate to our heart's content. My word, my ability to go off on tangents is marvelous.**

 **Edit: I forgot to put in a chapter title and left out a whole chat in the end slate, there's no new chapters, sorry 'bout that, but I just felt the need to fix that.**

 **Without further ado, here's:**

 _ **Chapter Five: In which Maxi meets the White Oracle Sage and his companions have a Lawn-front brawl.**_

* * *

"Look, Lady, I just want to return the damn wallet!" Maxi was having a very heated argument with the young lady at the front counter. Tall and light skinned with milky-blue hair and low pigtails, and yellow ocher glasses and short bangs, Mina Nishizawa was also a librarian at the same library that he'd found Blanc Whiteheart to be, even though he was still entirely confused by the fact that he was dead certain that Camilla had been the only librarian before hand. Now, he wasn't even sure where Camilla was. "I don't care whether or not she's available, if she's not, take the wallet and give it to her when she IS available, and if she's available right now, then just let me give it to her."

"I told you already, Blanc is not available and I will not take something of hers." Mina replied, her arms crossed. "If you need to consult her, come back tomorrow."

"Can I just leave the wallet on the counter here? Like... right here? Can she grab it herself?" he asked, holding the wallet just above the counter, "Is that an option?" Mina looked at the wallet in his hand, as if registering something.

"Oh... you..." Maxi raised his eyebrows. "You actually... what was I...?" Mina looked very confused as if she'd been doing something else just before now.

"You alright...?" he asked, now slightly concerned.

"Um... yes? I'm fine, thank you, but where... where am I?" Maxi shook off his previous frustration, this was the thrid time within the week that a female had come to him for assistance with something. Not to mention, that wasn't counting how many times Felicia had helped him and he'd helped her, and it also wasn't counting Vert, though that kind of worked as well. He tried to formulate a plan. After failing to do so, he figured it would be best to just answer her questions.

"Brookhaven Library. Know the place?" he asked. It was possible that she didn't. If she was with Blanc, which was possible, then maybe she was from another world? If she was, then he wasn't sure how to help her, but he'd figure it out. "You don't, do you?"

"Not personally, but I do recall having read up on it. It's where Blanc and I... I'm sorry, who are you?" she seemed to be trying to recall multiple things at once. Maxi brushed that off and got to the question.

"Maximillian Penumbra, at your service Ms. Nishizawa. My friends call me Maxi, feel free to do the same." he said. He immediately regretted it afterwards, noting that she wouldn't have remembered telling him her name. She looked at him peculiarly, indicating that it probably was her name, and she hadn't told him. He nodded. "Beg pardon, I apologize if that isn't your name, I have a friend who looks quite like you, though I suppose her hair was more red...? Hm... never mind that. She looks like you and has that name, though her name is Jollisa?" he was making all of this up. "My apologies, what is your name?"

"Mina Nishizawa, pleased to meet you, Maxi, and please, Mina is just fine." Mina bowed slightly and held out her hand. Maxi took it and shook it with a friendly smile. "I suppose I'm a bit new here still, I don't suppose your a frequenter, are you?" Maxi subtly noted that he wasn't the only one who could make things up. Camilla was like... twenty something? She had no intention of retiring anytime soon. Something was up with that, but it was too sudden to bring it up now. "Oh, nevermind that, what can I help you with? We can chat afterwards... My apologies, what do you need?" He lightly chuckled from how scatterbrained she was when she was startled.

"Ms. Whiteheart? She works here as well, yes?" Mina nodded, a faint smile forming on her lips.

"I see, I will call her for you, I'm sure she'd be happy to have such a cute boy come to see her." Maxi managed not to become flustered, maintaining his professional attitude.

"Ha ha, I'm afraid your mistaken, Mina. I'm here to return her wallet, nothing else. I simply happened across it while taking a walk. Being the good person I like to think I am sometimes, I came to return it." He told her. She smiled and moved over to something that looked like an intercom panel.

"Right, right, I'll call the lady for you." Maxi noted the tone of her voice. She said Lady respectfully, not jokingly, so Lady was probably her title. Lady Whiteheart, huh? He'd be sure to refer to her as such. "Blanc, there's someone here to see you." she called into the panel. There was no response, but Maxi figured the message had gotten across. The girl entered the room and looked him in the eye. Her sandy coloured hair and blue eyes caught his attention before he noted her white and blue hat with similarly coloured outfit, ribbons and accents adorning her clothing in various places, as well as a blue gemstone on a ribbon around her neck. Maxi made a quick mental adjustment to not try and flirt with her. Just looking at her and reading her aura told him that she wasn't very fond of such things. He straightened himself out, correcting his posture and attempting to be professional.

"Can I help you?" she asked. Her voice was gentle, soothing even. Maxi liked the sound of it. He presented her wallet to her without speaking. She took it and gave him a bow. "Thank you. I was wondering where I'd left this." Maxi nodded.

"It's no trouble. It was out by the beach. I imagine you must have been reading there and it simply slipped out of your pocket." Blanc smiled slightly at his intuition.

"You're very perceptive." she told him, "piecing that together by yourself." Maxi shrugged.

"Maybe. though I suppose it's also just the fact that your a librarian. Not to mention, I've done so a few times myself." he brushed his hair aside with his hand, the motion was smooth and unintentionally suave. Blanc's heart fluttered slightly without her permission. "It's a natural thing to do, so don't think too much of it, I'm just glad it was me who found it, and not someone who would've merely taken it for themselves." suddenly, his eye lens blipped slightly, displaying something to him. It had analyzed the mysterious currency in her wallet and presented him with a name. "That's an awful lot of credits you've got there, would really be a shame to lose them all. I bet it was hard to earn them." Both Blanc and Mina seemed to stumble over the processing of this sentence. He had just used the proper name of a currency that came from a world other than his. How as that possible? Blanc wasn't sure whether to confront him to assure this wasn't a trap, or to act like it was normal. Maxi spoke up before she could decide. "Ha ha... my bad. Those credits, not from this world, right? Their appearance and your unusual name lead me to figuring that out. So maybe I ought to redo this, because I think I've figured this straight." He bowed on one knee, brought his fist over, bending his arm in front of him, bowing like a knight before a king. "Lady Whiteheart, I welcome you to the city of New Kory." he stood and smiled at her. "I hope you enjoy it as much as we as the residents do." She smiled at his introduction, unsure of whether it was silly, flattering, fitting, or just downright strange. Maybe it was a combination of all of them? Whatever it was, she sort of liked it. Blanc was starting to think she sort of liked him, and she had only just met him. Well... what was the trouble with that? He was a smart fellow, he'd figured all of this out on his own, he was a polite fellow, he'd returned her wallet and welcomed her to the new city, and, this was the interesting part, she found him to be... handsome wasn't the word... but... good looking. Like... really good looking. Something about the way he appeared visually really appealed to her, and she couldn't pinpoint what it was. That was, until she thought about why her mind was hooked on such a subject.

Blanc was very into reading, as Maxi had deduced, it was the main reason she'd chosen the guise of a librarian for the time she was spending here. AS such, she'd read quite a few books, magna novels, and even some fanfictions that were centered around love. Not only that, but she'd observed couples around the city, most notably on the beach, the one she'd chosen to read at, displaying small, yet meaningful, means of affection to each other, even though they were in public space and openly visible. They were small, a hug, a kiss, holding hands, sitting very close together, she'd even observed a couple simply longingly staring into each others' eyes on one of the docks. One of the series she was in the middle of had a heroine very similar to herself. A young librarian, even similar in appearance and attitude. She young man she'd fallen in love with was a business man. One who'd started his own business at a young age after losing his parents. Blanc silently wondered if Maxi was anything like this boy. That was what drew her to his appearance though, he looked, detail for detail, exactly like the boy in the book. As such, Blanc had an undeniable urge to try and talk to him, to get to know him... to... true goddess, this was embarrassing... she wanted to know what it would be like to... how did she word this? She wanted to take strolls with him in the evenings. She wanted to have casual, maybe flirty chats him. She wanted to be the couple staring into each others' eyes on the docks. She wanted to feel her lips touch his. She... crap. She liked him. That was what she was looking for.

"Thank you." she told him, a small smile crossing her lips. She wanted to ask him so much more. She wanted to talk to him, and get to know him, and even take a walk with him, but she knew that was simply a dream. He raised his hands in a more casual, laid back sort of shrug. True goddess, that move was exactly like the boy from her book.

"It's no trouble. Now then, I hate to cut this short, but I've got to get home...?" she stepped over to him, holding out her hand slightly, as if she wanted to say something, but couldn't find the words. It puzzled Maxi, but made him pause. "Something I'm forgetting Lady Blanc?" he asked. He knew this next comment was risky, but he just couldn't help himself, "I don;t suppose you want a goodbye kiss, do you?" Mina giggled lightly behind the counter, knowing exactly what was going on in Blanc's head, and debating whether or not Blanc was about to say yes. The comment caught Blanc off guard, he even sounded and spoke like the boy from her book.

"Um... heh..." 'Damn it, Blanc! Speak! Don't make yourself look like an idiot!' Blanc silently argued with herself. "A question for you, just a really quick one." Maxi nodded and repositioned himself, so he was no longer facing the door, and walked back over to her. He stopped at about where he was before, Blanc slightly disappointed that he hadn't come closer. "Do I seem... approachable to you?" she asked. She knew that her attitude was slightly standoffish, she just wanted to hear it from him. Maxi simply nodded. She gave him a blank stare. After a moment or two, he spoke to clarify himself.

"You come off as perfectly approachable to me." he said calmly. "Matter of fact, I'd consider you more approachable that I'd consider any of the other people I've talked to recently." the funniest part was that he wasn't entirely making that up. Neptune was a wild card, Noire was tsun all over the place, and Kupo was the kind of guy who would walk into a tavern in old ages and lay his sword on the counter saying 'god send me no need of thee!' and by the third or fourth drink, he'd draw on the barkeep for no reason whatsoever. That aside, the only one that didn't apply to was Felicia. He found Felicia more and more approachable by the day now, matter of fact, he found that he was happier more often when he was with her, rather than without. It had even gotten to the point where he would stumble over himself and even get frustrated and upset more easily when she wasn't around. "Why do you ask?" he replied to Blanc, coming back to his senses. Blanc cleared her throat slightly.

"Just, errrr... curious." she responded slightly shakily. "Glad to hear it though." she said this, her smile returning and a very light blush crossing her face. "I don't suppose you could elaborate though?" she asked. Maxi took a moment to contemplate his answer closely before replying.

"Alright, sure." he said, "Just don't take this the wrong way, but you are a beautiful young lady, and I can see how a lot of people would want to talk to you, it's natural." he made sure to cover all the topics with precision and in the most concise manner possible so as not to waste her time, "But now the problem comes in when you attract the wrong kind of attention, you wind up with guys who want to force themselves onto you, I'm sure you know what I mean?" she nodded silently, "Yeah, yet you have a very calm and cool demeanor, so that covers you on that front, you can keep your cool with the best of them, I can see that, it's just..." he paused, trying to think about how to word this. "Not all guys are scumbags." he said, deciding on a phrasing, "The ones that aren't, who would like to talk to you, might get slightly put off by your demeanor, it would be easy to mistake it for coming off as cold. So a good guy might be slightly disinclined to talk to you. You know what I'm saying?"

Blanc considered this, trying to think about how her book's heroine would react. "Yes." One word, yet a sufficient answer. Nailed it. "So, a good guy like you?" she asked, narrowing her eyes slightly, trying to make herself look flirty. This flew over Maxi's head as he had to cover his mouth as he burst out laughing. Mina, who had been watching with eager eyes and receiving thorough entertainment, now looked slightly concerned. "Did I say something funny?" Blanc asked, a bit upset that her line had missed him entirely.

Maxi managed to regain his composure just enough to speak. "A good guy, huh? Nope. Doesn't seem like me." he said, "assumptions, infamously making an ass out of you and me. Let's not go there. Keep you judgments to facts, not to look Blanc. A good guy is one of the last terms I'd go to for myself." Blanc now looked on with curiosity. He had purposely thrown off that compliment. The boy from her book would have done the same thing, yet if he was just trying to flirt with her, surely he would have taken such a compliment and run with it. Blanc supposed that she had unintentionally tested him, and he had unintentionally passed. She smiled.

"So if that's not the terms I should use, what term would you have me use for you?" she asked, setting him up, seeing if he would pick up. Maxi realized what she was referring to, recalling the line from the book in his head. he recited it with the utmost verve.

"How about friend? Can we do that?" technically the line was used twice. Blanc was hoping he might use the second version. The first one, used earlier on, was the one he'd used. The second one, used later, replaced the word 'friend' with the word 'lover.' Blanc took a moment to have a deep breath and calm herself. She'd just met this boy and she was already slightly obsessing over him.

"I'm sure we can work that out... so long as... maybe we have some more time?" she took a risk, maybe he would accept it? Maxi pondered it for a moment. He did need to get home, but at the same time, he wasn't entirely inclined to leave Blanc just yet either.

"Yeah, I'm sure I've got some time." he said, relaxing. Something about her made him curious, and he wanted to find out what it was. Granted, he was missing all kinds of excitement at home, but that could wait. Could it? Probably not, let's have a look at that.

* * *

Felicia and Kupo had arrived quite some time ago and handled the introductions in a nice and neat fashion. Granted, that was probably done as an alternative to writing yet another introduction scene, but in all seriousness, for continuity's sake, it wouldn't make any sense for the previous teleportation only to arrive now. Kupo was in the armory, yes, Maxi has an armory, cleaning his equipment, getting ready to have a new adventure. He had planned to try and travel dimensions, or go to another world, maybe one like the one his buddy Saito had told him about, Noire walked in while he was doing so.

"What's all... what the fuck?!" Noire was quickly cut off by her own reaction of this room. The walls and shelves were lined with different kinds of weapons, from swords, to spears, and axes, and guns, to... was that a yo-yo? There was a few shoulder cannons over there, a repair arm too, as well as several add-on limbs, it looked like Maxi had previously been running around with several arms. Was that a flamethrower? Why did Maxi have a rocket launcher? Was that a grenade launcher? Er... why was that... was that a ukulele? True goddess, Noire wasn't even sure what some of these weapons were, and Maxi seemed to have at least two or three of everything. Were those qatars? Noire slightly jumped when she realized that all of these weapons were sharpened, loaded, had several spaces for extra add-ons, and were all very real and probably quite dangerous. She had a look around, spotting several things that looked highly impractical, yet very interesting. She picked up a black and cyan blade with cyber designs running up the side. It kind of looked like hers. Then again, Maxi wouldn't know anything about that. "Do we have any rapiers laying about that I could use?" Kupo turned to her.

"Your reaction changed quite quickly, didn't it?" Noire turned to him, a hand on her hip.

"Something wrong with that? Do you have a problem with a girl that values a sharp blade and a formidable form of self-defense?" Kupo was slightly taken aback, but was, at the same time, slightly relieved that Noire wasn't an extremely girly kind of girl. He had a feeling that he wouldn't get along with her very well if she was.

"Not at all," he suddenly shipped the blade in his hand over at Noire, leveling it at her. Noire flinched.

"What are you-?!" he smiled and chuckled a bit, swishing the blade quickly in a circle twice, now holding out the handle to Noire. The fashion in which he held the blade somehow managed to keep him safe from slicing his own hand. Noire took the blade and gave it a look over. "Er... right. That window in front of you, you are going to watch, I presume?" Kupo shrugged and grabbed another weapon to clean.

"I wasn't going to, I'm quite busy prepping my gear for my next expedition." Noire huffed. "I can watch if you want me to, but I think there are better ways I could spend my time." Noire simply stood staring at him, even though he went back to work. After a while, he spoke up again. "If you're just going to stand there, I hope you aren't planning on accomplishing anything. I'll glance out here and there to see how you're doing, just do what you will and leave me to the same, won't you?" Satisfied, though not entirely, Noire set out to try and show off to see if she could make him eat his words. He must have taken her as only an amateur, maybe not even that. She'd show him. Using all of her flashiest moves, Noire shadow fenced against a wall, her shadow, and eventually a training dummy. About and hour had gone by when Kupo stepped outside,two training rapiers at his side. She crossed her arms.

"I'll take my apology now," she said, assuming that he'd brought these swords so she could teach him something, "Let's hear it." she continued, turning her head to the side, putting a hand to her ear. Kupo shook his head.

"'Fraid not, Noire." he drew one blade and handed her the other, "do me a favor, come at me with whatever move you want to." she drew the blade and stabbed forth with all the speed she had, but he stopped it with relative ease. "So, I want you to know that I say this in the nicest way possible," he said, "but you're either out of practice, or you really just aren't suited for a sword like that." She crossed her arms.

"And why not?" she asked, her voice slightly on edge.

"No offense, that was one of the worst stabs I've ever seen someone make." Noire lashed out in rage, aiming for his head, but he caught her blade with his own, somehow having enough precision to counter the blade, the tip against the actual thin blade of the rapier. "Good, you've got the idea already." he spun his rapier around hers, grabbing the hilt, and swishing the blade around, then pointing the blade at her. "Shall we? Mayhaps a bit of a sparring session would help to bring your experience back around?" Noire went at him again, stabbing twice, and getting deflected each time. She continued at him for the better part of thirty minutes before he swept her off her feet with a well placed swipe. She sat up, glaring at him. "Do me a favor, stand up." she did so and went to swipe at him, but he moved in such a way that he was right next to her. "Alright, now shift here, extend your arm just a little bit to here, now shift your back foot back just a little, adjust this a bit, now do this... alright, now do it again." Noire's face had gone furiously red and she wanted nothing more than to swish his head off with the blade. She did the motion as he said, however, and this time, she noted that the blade tapped his shoulder before he was able to deflect it. "Alright, good. Now then, do what I showed you for some of your other strikes, play around with them a bit, and we'll go again in a few minutes?" the raven-haired girl could help but be intrigued. The one simple change had made everything so much better. She had at the training dummy again, noting that each strike had more speed and strength than it had before. What's more, is that she was able to return to her defensive position much more quickly than before. Suddenly, Noire heard a siren go off. Kupo looked up from sharpening his actual rapier, a noble looking thing that was much sharper, deadlier, and much more regal than Noire had ever seen. She went to hand him back her sword, but he wouldn't take it. "Think you'd better hold onto it if that's what it could be..." He grabbed a few daggers from the table in the armory before swishing his hand over his shoulder. "Come on, Noire! Let's move!"

She quickly followed after him, wondering what might have been wrong. Kupo grabbed a sword from a nearby room with a purple blade. "Hope this works..." he muttered to himself. As they ran by the living room, Neptune joined them in dashing down the hall. "Hey, Nep! You know how to use a sword?"

"You bet your booty I do, Kupo!" she yelled back. He tossed her the purple bladed sword he'd grabbed a few moments earlier.

"Then put that to some use!" when they got outside, Kupo was slightly startled by what he saw. One man was leading a group of... things... They were monsters, like the kind that you found in an rpg game, but these were very real. Felicia popped into existence next to him, sporting several daggers, two handguns, a sword of her own, and a pebble. "Fuck's the pebble for?" he asked. She turned to him.

"In case Maxi gets back in the middle of this. He won't use daggers, just this." Kupo shook his head.

"Hope he learns quickly." without drawing his weapons, he called out to the one man. "Hey! Buddy! You got a problem or something? Get your 'pets' off my lawn!" The man ignored his question.

"This is the residence of Maximillian Penumbra. For Lady Arfoire!" drawing a sword, the man charged, the monsters following suit behind him. Kupo drew his own blade, then jumped into the middle of them, slashing through the monsters with great strength and speed. Felicia, without hesitation, threw a solitary dagger, the blade landing squarely in the man's forehead, knocking him onto his back. Much to their surprise, the man dissipated into shadowy particles. Felicia wasted no time on this fact, and drew both handguns, firing into the crowd of monster with one hand and throwing daggers with the other. Neptune and Noire got their hands dirty, jumping into the fray with their weapons drawn. Neptune cut through the monsters like butter, and Noire stabbed through them like thrusting through air. Kupo's instruction earlier had really helped. Even with every hit downing a monster however, there were a lot of them. Felicia, decided, at that moment, to cease holding back, and tossed her hand guns aside, drawing her blade, which split into two, and she jump straight up in the air, and slammed into the middle with tremendous force. When the enemies were launched into the air, several light green spears pierced through them, finishing off whatever was left. Everyone turned to see who had just unleashed such an attack, a mature, blonde, green-dressed girl standing over towards the side.

"There will be time for explanations later," she said, "But for now, Maxi is in danger. Let's hurry." Kupo checked the capsule in his pocket to make sure it was secure, then nodded, and the group of five ran off towards the library.

* * *

 **So now, wait... do I even have any trivia to cover this time...? No? Let's reply to comments then, Maxi, pull up the comments for me.**

 **Maxi: Alright, so, ignoring the ones from Mr. DxD and Mr. Cloud, mainly because there was a whole PM chat on those and because they pertain to the first chapter, We've got five to talk about.**

 **24: Alright, hit me with the oldest one first.**

 **Maxi: Okay, so Mr. G1 ArchAngel said:** This is cute and fluffy with the appropriate amount of snark and drama AND I LOVE IT!  
 **24: Oh cool, thank's G1! I really appreciate that kind of comment, it lets me know what I'm doing right. I hope that the other chapters have been up to standard for you as well.**

 **Maxi: Okay, next up we've got Mr. JotAfonso:** Not bad, keep it up  
 **24: Thank you, Mr. Afonso. I will be sure to see this story through to it's end.**

 **Maxi: Alright, next comment is from a guest. It's a question one:** What other weapons and powers does Mazimillian have? and after noire, could it be vert or blanc after this?  
 **24: Uh... we kinda already answered that one... didn't we? Sorry dude, I took way too long to answer that question. Um... Weapon assessment on Maxi? Weeeeell, Maxi is a smart guy and can outwit his opponent quite easily, but he can also duke it out with the best of them. Maxi has very good endurance and an extremely quick and very efficient metabolism, making it so that food and drinks give him his energy back much faster. Maxi also has Myous which gives him some good magic spells, as well as his mighty pebble which he uses to smite thugs in chapter two, and Felicia's teleporation. I count that as a weapon because Felicia is very much like a person, but she is fully at Max's command, and has several available forms of combat, as demonstrated above. Other than that, Maxi is proficient in hand to hand comabt in the use of daggers, axes, pickaxes (yes, that's a thing), and spears, as well as having experience with several types of guns, but Maxi is unable of wielding swords, hammers, qatars, whips, staves, and wrist blades to any degree of usefulness. Anything else he's anywhere between okay and great with.**

 **Maxi: That assessment out of the way, next we've got Mr. Moppin' Glow:** It makes me wet...  
jk it wuz noice  
 **24:*overdramatic exasperated sigh* You sir... ugh... [This response is a joke, this commenter is a friend of mine irl]**

 **Maxi: Er... right, last but not least in the current comments Angeldoesmc said:** very exciting I have found another jew in the pile of HDN fanfics, great job man!  
 **24: Okaaay? I have no idea how to respond to that? Another 'jew?' Is that a typo? I think that's a compliment, so thanks? Um... Yeah it says great job... Thanks, Angel!**

* * *

 **Maxi: Alright, now that's all the comments, but you and I need to talk.  
24: Alright? I'm all ears, Maxi. What's up?  
Maxi: The other day we had a talk in chapter eighteen of the Paradox, I don't suppose you remember what we talked about?  
24: Was it my upload schedule? Or maybe the fact that we haven't updated that story in quite a bit?  
Maxi: It was mainly the latter, though the former could also use some work.  
24: Duly noted.  
Maxi: Since you promised Jayden that you'd get him a new chapter of Paradox to play with and read, I highly recommend you do that before uploading this story any further.  
24: So... that all?  
Maxi: That it is, if you need assistance, you know you can ask me.  
24: good to know. I'll try to put out a chapter for Paradox in between every two or so chapters of this one. Guess I'd better get to work.  
Maxi: Aren't your chapter questions due tomorrow.  
24: . . . Shiiiiiiit... that they are, Maxi.  
Maxi: Here, lemme give you a hand with those such that we might get back on this.  
24: Much appreciated, lemme do the outro first though because,t** **hat's all I've got for you this time!**

 **So then, as always, I hope you all have a lovely evening, and, be it here or anywhere elsewhere, may we meet again upon another chapter. See ya!**


	6. Rage and the Business Lady

**A/N: I can't believe how quickly I was able to get this done! This is like, two or three days after a chapter of Paradox, and this is coming out relatively well. I hope everyone likes this chapter! Since I've gotten this out quickly, I'll get the A/n over with quickly. Without further ado, here's:**

 _ **The Puppet Master: Chapter Six: Maxi Unleashes his rage and Meets the Black Lastation Business Lady**_

* * *

"Shoot..." Maxi checked his watch. He'd spent too much time with Blanc. "I gotta get going, Blanc... though... we can talk some other time, right?" her eyes lit up. "Here, let's exchange cell-phone numbers, that should keep us in touch." Blanc eagerly pulled out her phone and exchanged numbers with Maxi. "Can I come back tomorrow? Would that be okay?" he asked, quite eager himself to be able to spend more time with her. She nodded and smiled.

"You're welcome in my library at any time, Maxi. Well... so long as Mina's okay with you as well?" she turned to the assistant who gave a smiling thumbs up. She turned to him, and they stood, face to face for a while, unsure of what to do. Maxi could have left, but it felt... incomplete... Suddenly, Maxi's spine shook. A chill ran down his spine and he whipped around, his hand out, just in time to hear a bang, like a gunshot. His hand turned and cupped the air in a unique fashion, whirling about with just the right timing to catch the bullet. It burned his hand and he dropped it to the floor and looked at his aggressor. From the point where the bullet hit the floor, Maxi heard a faint hissing sound, and he looked down at the bullet to see a small dark crystal burning the floor. He looked back up at the thug. That was no normal bullet. He got serious disturbingly quick and lunged at the man, grabbing him, spinning him around and slamming his face into the wall. The man's neck bent in an interesting way, but Maxi didn't have time to check whether or not the thug was dead, a few more, accompanied by several things that he could only describe as monsters, had surrounded the entrance to the building. "Maxi?" Blanc asked from inside.

"Just stay back, I'll handle this." he said with confidence. Blanc growled a bit.

"That's not what I was going to say, I was going to ask whether or not you wanted a bit of help." Maxi didn't even think about such an obvious question.

"Well, sure. I wouldn't mind it I guess." he said nonchalantly. Blanc turned to Mina who grabbed a staff and hopped over the desk. Blanc brilliantly flashed out in a beam of light, and a girl, much like Blanc, simply with red eyes and white hair, and a bodysuit that Maxi recognized as an alloy material. He wasn't sure what the alloy was, but it seemed to be stronger than titanium, yet lighter than a feather. "Nice armor." he commented. She glared at him.

"Quit staring." she replied. He simply shrugged and threw a pebble into the face of a nearby monster, bursting it into pixels.

"I mean sure, I wasn't staring in the first place, but I guess... wait, how do you do less of a something that you were not doing already?" Blanc simply looked over at him, giving him the stereotypical, 'please close the hole in your face before I sew it shut' sort of look. Maxi decided to ask questions about both that and the transformation later. He grabbed another stone, punched a thug in the face, then dropped another monster with the stone. Well this could wind up being a little bit longer than he'd originally anticipated, but it seemed to be going just fine. With Blanc wielding her axe and slashing through monster after monster like she didn't give a damn, and Mina launching icicles and freezing winds everywhere, everything seemed to be mostly under control. Maxi pulled out of his bag, a small box. He tossed the box up in the air, and it unfolded while it spun. When it landed in front of him, he had a fully functioning exoskeleton suit at his command. He punched a monster in the face, the exosuit giving his punch so much force that the monster simply exploded into pixels on contact. Maxi debated turning the power down a bit later, but decided to keep it high for situations like this. Suddenly, it seemed like they were being overwhelmed. "Alright, let's see how they like this!" Maxi threw four small wooden boxes into the air, each unfolding into a puppet of himself. When the puppets landed, each of the four drew a bow and began to aim and launch saw blades from their bows into the crowds of monsters. Now with the strength of seven people working at once, they found the job much easier. When the monsters were finally cleared, a woman in witch's garb, and with violet-gray skin, floated down into the center of the street. In one fell swoop, she felled all four of Maxi's puppets, Mina, and Blanc. Maxi managed to stay standing, but only just. His exoskeleton shattered, leaving him only to his normal strength. He was breathing ragged, and the witch simply smiled.

"Now then, White Heart, Let's have that power, shall we?" she grabbed Blanc, and Blanc screamed out in pain, reverting back to her normal form. Seeing this filled Maxi with rage. Mina was out cold, and there was no one to help him. The witch walked over to him. "And just who are you?" she asked. "Mayhaps you are the hero they were looking for to save them? Fat chance, kid. You're nothing but a boy. I could kill you here and now if I wanted to, don't forget it."

"Try and harm him and I'll tear you to pieces!" the witch looked up just in time to catch a flying show in the face. Felicia Landed next to Maxi, checking him over. "Maxi! Are you alright?! That witch is going to-" Felicia was cut off as Maxi grabbed two daggers, the handguns, and the pebble from her, all in the blink of an eye, and burst forwards in a blast of speed, towards the witch. Filled with rage, he launched himself into the air, and spun, lining himself up and dropping his elbow in a viscous spiraling motion, rocketing the witch back to the ground. Maxi landed on the floor with a thud a yard or two away.

"Hey, bro! Heads up!" Kupo lobbed the capsule over to Maxi, and Maxi took it in his hand, the capsule elongating into a cyan and black spear when it landed in his hand. Three girls, who Maxi figured to be Blanc, Vert, and Neptune, except in that weird form that Blanc had done, landed at the ready, but they were seemingly surprised that most of the work had already been done. The witch rose and glared at Maxi.

"I am the witch Arfoire, boy! You cannot defeat me so easily." she hissed. Maxi glared right back, his rage-blooded glare making the witch recoil out of fear.

"Good, I wasn't done beating the shit out of you yet. One hit is hardly enough." he spun the spearing in a circular motion, the blade swishing by so quickly that it appeared as a disc. When he brought it to a stop, the blade seemed to glow with energy, and he brandished it, ready to drop Arfoire like the villain she was. She rushed in, a staff in her hand, and they went at each other at a blinding pace, clashing and swinging at each other, some hits connecting, some getting parried, and others simply missing completely. When the backed away, it wasn;t by choice, it was by Maxi's forceful blow to her staff, kocking both of them back. Arfoire's body suddenly erupted with slashes and she fell to one knee, holding her body, blood spilling to the ground. Maxi stepped in and viciously swung upwards in a rending motion, any more force behind the blow would've been enough to remove the witch's head from her body entirely. She fell on her back, several yards away, knocked back a good distance. Maxi collapsed his spear and put the capsule in his pocket. "Now get out of my face before I decide to end this here and now." The witch obliged, teleporting away. Maxi shambled back over to his party, Felicia and Kupo running over to assist him in walking. The other three seemed to be busy checking over Blanc and Mina. Maxi sighed heavily. "Felicia, Kupo, let's get them back to the house to run medical checks on them. Not to mention, to get some sleep as well. Let's get going." Suddenly, Maxi heard the wailing of police sirens. "Shit. I'll deal with them. Felicia, get everyone else out of here." Felicia nodded and threw out her arms, light flashing, and all but Maxi disappearing. As the Police drew nearer, Maxi put up his hands. Luckily, Felicia had taken all the weapons with her, but Maxi was sort of standing amongst the body of a bunch of thugs.

"Freeze! This is the police!" an officer yelled from his car.

"No shit!" Maxi yelled back.

"We have you surrounded! Surrender yourself!"

"My hands are already up, what else do you fucking want?!" Maxi held out his hands, allowing himself to be cuffed, and complying with everything the officer said, making small talk with him on the way back to the station. The officer took him out of the car and and turned him around to look at him, face to face.

"You know, son, I've half a mind to let you go right here. You don't seem like a criminal to me, but rules is rules, so you know how it is. I'll try to help you out though. My son works for you, ya know that?"

"Oh really?" Maxi inquired, genuinely curious, "What's his name?"

"Name's Joe, same as mine."

"Ah, Joe. Yes I know him, I saw him just earlier today, in fact. He's a hard worker, that kid." Joe the officer chuckled hoarsely.

"Ah, sure is. He wanted to be an officer like his old man, but he didn't have the physical build for it."

"That so?" things like that were what they exchanged as they progressed. Eventually, Maxi found himself in an interrogation room, and he sat back, waiting for his interrogator to enter the room. A young person walked into the room, short blue hair, and a business suit on their person. "Evening, Ma'am." he said to her. Her eyes instantly got curious.

"Oh? You're not going to refer to me as a male like all the others? I'm impressed already." the girl responded. "The name is Kei, Kei Jinguji. I would say I'm going to interrogate you, but I think we already know all we need to know." Maxi raised an eyebrow.

"Oh?" mayhaps this would go much smoother than he had anticipated? "Is there something I'm missing?"

"Maybe, though let me explain this to you. You felled about twenty thugs all on your own, and that's with no weapons. We have biological readings that you have a brother, who possesses the same, if not better physicality than you do. You committed no crime, and you brought the thugs down for us, so what is there for me to ask you that can't wait?" Kei asked him. He liked her already. "Just know that I may need to call for your help again sometime, that's all. Other than that, just keep me in mind, yes? Here's my phone number. Call me if you have questions. I may have one for you later. Do me a favor and keep your door open, I'll need to talk to you later this evening." Maxi nodded.

"Certainly. I'm glad you and I think the same way." he told her. She smiled and offered her hand.

"Let me escort you out so you don't get lost, and the officers won't think you're escaping." Maxi nodded.

"That would definitely help. I think the Police Station is the one public building that I haven't been in very many times."Kei giggled a bit.

"I would certainly hope not. I'd like to think you're a guy who doesn't do the wrong thing." Maxi laughed.

"At least I haven't gotten caught yet." Kei laughed back, and showed him out of the station.

"Just remember to keep the door open for me?" he nodded.

"Later, Kei." and with that, he headed off back towards his home.

When he got there, Maxi was greeted by seven friendly faces, those being Felicia, Kupo, Noire, and Neptune, those which he expected, and also Vert, Blanc, and Mina, those he was not expecting. Suddewnly, someone tapped him on the shoulder. It was Kei. "Good to see we're all here for the most part. We'll take care of who we're missing later. For now, let's talk, Maxi."

Maxi sat at his table, everyone sitting, drinking, and eating food. Now that they were done eating, Kei sat up. "So now that you've served us dinner, and that was a supreme meal by the way, my compliments to the chef, Felicia." Felicia gave a wide smile and a nod of the head. Kei turned to Maxi. "So now, Maxi, I want you not to take this the wrong way..."

"Sure, I hardly ever take anything badly. You can ask Felicia, I've got the heart of a small boy." Kei raised her eyebrows.

"Oh really? Is that true?" Maxi nodded earnestly.

"Oh sure it is. I keep it in a glass jar in the back of my closet." Every head in the room turned to him. "Gods, it's a Robert Bloch joke, people." Blanc raised an eyebrow in question.

"I though it was a Stephen King quote?" she inquired. Maxi shook his head.

"Common mistake, he borrowed it. Nonetheless, what's this issue that you're afraid of me taking badly?" he asked, turning back to Kei. "I doubt anything could surprise me at this point."

"Well then, if you're so confident, all of us here would like to move in with you." Kei said as if it was the most normal thing in the world.

"Yeah sure, why not?" Maxi responded, equally nonchalantly. It was sort of his specialty. Now it was Kei's turn to be surprised.

"Er... what?" she asked quickly. Maxi shrugged.

"Why the fuck not? We've got the space. Felicia, get some guest rooms ready for me, will you?" Felicia teleported out of the room in a burst of energy to prepare the rooms. Kei pointed over to where Felicia had been just standing.

"Did she just...?"

"Teleport? Yeah, what of it?" Kei smiled as she leaned back on the table.

"You and I have a lot to talk about Maximilllian." she said, pointing a finger at him. He shrugged.

"Yeah? Get in line." he said casually. Felicia blipped back into the room.

"All done, Maxi!" she exclaimed. He gave her a thumbs up.

"Excellent job, Felicia." he kissed her cheek. Kei turned a bit red at the display of affection. "Now then, is there anything else you wanted to talk about, Kei?" Kei recovered her composure before giving him and answer.

"Eh... no. That will be all for now." she said, a bit shakily. Maxi gave a bit of a silent chuckle before heading off to bed, Felicia close behind him. When he got to his room, she entered with him. He turned to her.

"Something you need, Felicia?" he asked. She turned red... somehow...?

"Um... no. I just thought... you might like the company?" Maxi turned a bit red when he realized what she was implying.

"Sure. Especially if it's you." he said with a smile, and pressed his lips against hers. She eagerly pressed back, and eventually when they pulled apart, she was beaming like crazy. "Why don't you get changed for bed? I'll do the same." Felicia headed off to change, and Maxi changed into a white undershirt and some boxers. When Felicia came back, she was wearing similar garb, simply replacing the boxers with briefs, and the undershirt with a form fitting tank-top. Maxi pulled back the covers of the bed and held one arm out, as if holding a door for her. She slid under the covers, pulling him under behind herself. She held him close, and Maxi could feel himself getting red as he wrapped his arms around her in return, savoring the feeling of her body up to his. He relaxed, easing up as she hugged him. Maxi began to drift off, the warmth of Felicia's body making him drowsy. As he faded off to sleep, he reflected on the day.

He knew one thing for certain. Things were going to be a lot more exciting from now on. He was looking forward to it.

* * *

 **Ah, getting things done feels good. Is there any trivia for me to cover here? I dunno, Maxi, I think there's more comments. What have we got?**

 **Maxi: Actually, we've only got one more that I can see right now. So here we go, Mr.** **Praixz Zer0 said: "** its amazing how different the story feels with just one different character keep up the good work"  
 **24: Well certainly! I'm glad you like the change! I really think, even though Maxi and Shugo are much different, Maxi fits the part quite well.**

 **Maxi: Okay, We've also got a few questions from pre-readers and other people. You know, questions we can answer before they get asked. The first one is about that last scene with Felicia and I, like what inspired you to put that in?  
24: I think it was mainly due to a lot of people irl requesting me to put in a bit more of a love scene. The reason I decided to use Maxi and Felicia is because Felicia is the only one who seems to have enough affinity with Maxi for the scene to fit. I know Felicia's an android, but she's practically a person in the way she functions. Oh and by the way, that is not a sex scene. They're just sleeping in the same bed. Calm down. I can here Noire yelling at me already...**

 **Maxi: Riiight...? So another question: this one's from Vert actually, she wants to know why Blanc, Neptune, and Noire got an affection based scene, but she only got the cold shoulder from me on the first go.  
24: You mean other than the fact that it was in the script? I think I explained this bit already? Whatever, in case we missed it the first time, or I just forgot it, Maxi is based off an actual person, and his initial reactions are one and the same with Maxi's, or at least they have been up and through this point. I might change that, I dunno.**

 **Maxi: Cool, cool, Here's one from Myous, he wants to know why he wasn't in that scene.  
24: That's my fault. I got carried away while writing this, Myous was supposed to be in this scene, then he just kind of wasn't because it ended too quickly. Oops.**

 **Now that those are out of the way, I'm going to go make some lunch, so let's do this outro.**

 **So then, I hope you all have a lovely evening, and, be it here or anywhere elsewhere, may we meet again upon another chapter. See ya!**


	7. The Forged Guide and the Cry for Help

**A/N: So this chapter is a bit of a cluster fudge, but It's what I could come up with. Some chapters are obviously better than others because I'm either having a much better time with them, or I'm simply writing in something that I've been planning forever. Anyways, let's just get on with the chapter, here's:**

 _ **The Puppet Master: Chapter 7; In which Maxi creates Forged Guide and sends out a Cry for Help**_

 **Enjoy.**

* * *

Maxi stood in his forge, banging away at an ingot with a hammer, straightening the thing into a blade. He wasn't quite sure what it would look like when it was done. He could sense the presence of someone behind him, just over his shoulder, but he was too busy to turn around and see who it was. Eventually, Maxi decided to inquire about his visitor. "Need something?" he asked in between swings of the hammer.

"No, just observing." the voice belonged to Noire. Maxi could have figured it would have been her. Noire seemed to be the most interested in the various weaponry he had laying about.

"Observing? There's a window over there for that." Maxi said, now removing the forging mask from his face, and pointing over to the observation window with his hammer. Noire looked over, sure enough, there was indeed a window. "Even if you wanted a closer look, I'd recommend something more... work orientated." he gestured to her clothing, she was wearing her normal garb. She crossed her arms.

"What's that supposed to mean?" she asked, "It's not like I wanted a closer look or anything." Maxi shook his head.

"Then get behind the window." he responded, his eyes dull. A parakeet landed on the tip of the anvil, looked up at Maxi, then said something in a language that Noire didn't understand. Maxi doubled over laughing.

"W... w-what did it say?" Maxi straightened himself out.

"Kay, first off, Sancho here is a guy, so that's he, not it. He's not an object, thank you very much." Maxi said with just a bit too much flamboyancy, second, I don't think you wanna know what he said." Noire crossed her arms and gave him a very cross glare. "Alright, you brought this on yourself..." Maxi had to take a moment to think about the translations of what Sancho had just told him. "Okay, so the literal translation makes no sense." He said first. He sounded out the words to himself before speaking. "It's a language called Xenic, it took me a while to figure it out. Su-k kiil-liona ku-l. That's what he said, so... 'Su' is type or kind, combined with the '-k' makes it 'kind of.' Next up... 'kiil' is annoying dog, or bitch as we'd put it in English, and the 'liona' that comes afterwards represents a negation after a passage of time, or just a change over time in general, and lastly, the 'ku' means 'is not' but the addition of the -l on the end of it makes it 'isn't it' and he phrased it like a question so... yeah, again, literal translation is 'kind of bitch that changes over time, isn't it?' since he's referring to you, 'it' changes to 'she.' There aren't really words for gender in Xenic... um... yeah, loosely translated and interpreted, he basically just said, 'wow, tsundere.' Is that what you wanted?" Noire huffed and glared at the bird. The bird spat something rude sounding out in that weird language again, causing Maxi to give it a sideways angry glance. "Hey, be nice."

"What'd he say that time?" Noire asked. It sounded like 'Ku-l su-k shan-shaliaaza.'

"Uh... Ku-l, isn't it, su-k, kind of, shan is a validation word, though the was he used it basically means true, and shaliaaza is... more or less a rude way of finishing the sentence. It's the equivalent of calling you a nasty name afterwards. So, loosely, again, that's something like, Isn't it kind of true, ass? While I agree with him, there's no need for that kind of language." Maxi noted as if it were the most normal thing ever. Noire's head was spinning.

"You're gonna have to teach me this some other time." Maxi shrugged.

"That's fine, now back to the topic at hand, put on something more suiting or get behind the window." Noire frowned, debating which she wanted to do. Eventually she agreed to put on something more fitting to the area. "Sancho, make yourself useful." he told the bird, "Get Noire a smithing outfit." Sancho left and came back sporting some metal plating and carrying a suit that looked like her size. "Go ahead and get changed, there's a changing room just over there." Maxi gestured to a door. Noire left to put on the clothes. Somehow, they fit her perfectly, matter of fact, looking in the mirror available, she even wanted to say she looked quite good in them. The outfit was a white shirt and thick tan pants accompanied by a thick working apron, thick gloves, and a blue puffy hat that was something of a combination between a beanie and a messenger hat. She quite liked the hat. The outfit had also come with some brown thin rimmed rounded glasses that she thought looked quite good on her as well. She walked back out to greet Maxi, who she had only just realized was in similar garb, simply minus the hat and replacing it with a protective mask. He looked Noire up and down. "Good. Now I don't have to worry about you getting burned or anything. Also, now you don't have to worry about your clothes getting dirty." The bird flapped his wings.

"Hey, don't forget, I was the one who picked the outfit." Noire recognized that voice. Where had it come from? She looked around in confusion. The same voice laughed. "Ha! You know the voice, but you don't remember where it comes from, do you? Look at the anvil." Noire turned and looked at the tip of the anvil. The parakeet moved his wings so it looked like he was bowing, then spread his wings out again. "Ta da!"

"What the fuck, he can talk?" Noire almost shrieked. Of all things she was expecting, that was not one of them.

"Why certainly I can. Matter of fact, I can probably speak better than most people you know." Noire managed to calm herself down. "I can also down most things better than most people you know." Noire crossed her arms.

"Oh yeah? Can you smith better than Maxi can?" she asked him. The parakeet facepalmed... er... winged? Facewinged? We'll stick with facepalmed. Maxi turned to Noire.

"Where do you think I learned it from?" he asked. "Besides, you've never seen me smith before, how do you know I can do it well? Why would you assume that? I can't do everything well you know."

Noire shook her head. "Nonsense, everything you've done so far has been exception..al..." Noire realized at the end of the sentence what she sounded like. "Er... not that I care or anything! Not that I've... not that I've been paying attention or any... anything? Um... idiot!" Sancho took his face out of his feathers just long enough for both him and Maxi to facepalm in unison. "Shut up!" Noire quickly hissed. Maxi shook his head.

"If you don't believe me that Sancho taught me to smith, he can teach you to do it just as easily." Sancho bowed.

"I would be honored to teach you." he said politely. He looked over at Maxi and Maxi gave him an approving nod. "See? I can be nice when I want to." It was another thirty minutes before any progress was made, but Noire was, indeed, metal smithing like a professional. However, when her products came out, they just weren't the way she wanted them to be. Maxi, noticing this, walked over to observe. Sancho was keeping a close eye on the materials in the furnace. After a while, Maxi knew what the problem was.

"Okay, here, swing the hammer like this, and try to focus more over here." he said, demonstrating with his hands, making rapid gestures that sort of looked like flailing movements.

"Easy for you to say," Noire quickly shot back, "I have no idea what that means." Maxi sighed.

"Fine, here," he went over and stood behind her, guiding her hands through the motion. "Like this. I'll do it with you." Noire's face turned hot red, but she accepted it. Kupo had helped her before in much the same way, yet when Maxi did it... Noire felt a bit of a burning sensation in her chest... She tried her best to ignore it. When Maxi was done guiding her, Noire tried it herself, noting that the swing took less effort, and the blade wound up sharper. She looked it over, satisfied with the result. She showed it to Maxi and Sancho who both gave her a nod of approval. Maxi went back over to finish his own blade.

"So what are these actually for?" she asked. Maxi turned to her, lifting his mask, gesturing over to Sancho first.

"Hey, take this and quench it in that hot oil for me?" The bird came over and took the weapon, flying off to do so. "A friend of mine ordered a weapon. Her name's Histoire." he said. "Something about needing a weapon for something she was doing? I don't know. Histoire's a nice lady. I don't ask questions, I just do. Besides, she's the mother of a good friend of mine, also a man of business, his name's Jay. Also a nice guy." To Noire, the name 'Histoire' was familiar, but the name 'Jayden' was not. Sacho came back with the sword, the blade now a lustrous blue colour. Noire quite liked it.

"How'd you do that?" she asked, pointing at the sword. Maxi looked at it.

"Oh, hey, that's a nice touch, Sancho." the bird gave a happy little squawk and set the blade back down so Maxi could finish it. As he was doing so, he explained it to Noire. "So, looks like he did this somewhere between 282 and 310 Celsius. When you heat the blade like this, if you do it carefully enough, you can colour the metal that way. I've been told that talented magic users can enchant coloured blades to have elemental or energy properties, but I've never learned how to actually use magic, so go figure, I guess. I couldn't confirm that second bit for you." Noire carefully inspected the blade.

"Maybe you ought to have Mina look at it? You said she could use magic, right? If Histoire needs that blade for something, chances are she's going to need it in the best shape possible." Maxi took that into consideration. He quickly fashioned a sheath for the blade out of some leather, silver pieces and a gold crest before putting the blade in its new sheath and heading off to find Mina, the bird sitting on his shoulder.

When Maxi found Mina, she seemed to be treating Vert with some sort of magic, which Maxi was not familiar with. He walked over. "This seems important." Mina ignored him, so he had a seat until Mina spoke.

"Okay, Vert. I know where she is. That witch who stole your powers has her as well." Maxi raised an eyebrow.

"That also sound important, what am I missing?" Vert looked over at him.

"You remember when I explained to you how we are goddesses, yes?" vert said, as if it were the most normal thing ever. Maxi merely nodded back with the same casual attitude. "Well, you remember what happened to my power, yes?" Maxi nodded again. "Well, here's the problem. Kei, and Mina, they are oracles, yes? Well, I have one as well, her name is Chika, and the same person who stole my powers has my beloved oracle as well. I'll not stand for this, and while Neptune may not worry about her oracle, and not care, I care very much about mine, and I'd like her back." Maxi gave a devilish grin.

"Then we'll knock two birds with one stone. First though, Mina you're a magic user, see this coloured blade? I don't suppose you can enchant it with anything, can you?" Mina had a look at the blade, examining it as if there was something extremely special about it. Maxi raised an eyebrow. "Something wrong?" he asked. Mina looked up at him.

"I've never seen this colour done properly before. This is probably the most powerful colour you could have given this blade. Here, let me enchant it for you." Mine held up her staff and the blade took on a brilliant cyan light. "This kind of blade possesses extraordinary power and guides the holder. That means you can wield it with skill even if it's your first time with a sword. A skilled user on the other hand, well they'd be almost unstoppable with it." Maxi nodded.

"Why thank you." he said. He took the blade and stashed it away for later. "Now then, let's get ready. I'll meet you in the armory when you're done. Alert anyone you wanna take with us, I've gotta get ready myself." Maxi headed off, a bit excited for the adventure they were about to have. He fixed his exoskeleton and got it on, installing minor upgrades here and there, then he grabbed a quiver full of spears. After that, he equipped himself with several types of knives, making sure that he had whatever knife he needed, karambits, long-blades, hunting blades, butterflies, anything you could think off, really. After he had all that, he grabbed his capsule spear that Kupo had given him. He thought he was all ready to head out, but he remembered something just as important. He headed over, into the one dark room, not far from Noire's room. He looked at the mask, sitting on the counter. It picked itself up and looked over at him.

'Finally remembered me, didn't you? I'm just as excited at you are.' it said to him. He picked up Myous and slung him over his shoulder. Suddenly, Maxi felt a bit smarter. Myous' eyes seemed to glisten slightly. 'Feel that? I've got more powers than you probably think I do. You'll see.' Maxi headed out, but not before triggering his emergency plan. He wasn't sure he would need it, but he might wind up needing it, and it was better to be safe than sorry. Suddenly, Maxi heard the doorbell.

"FELICIAAAAA! THE DOOOOR!" he shouted out. After a while, Felicia showed up in the room.

"It's your master medic and your guild master, sir." Maxi looked at her with a blank expression.

"I don't remember asking for those?" he asked.

"That's because I asked for them for you." said Kei walking into the room. She gestured to the two girls following her, one with a black outfit under an oversized blue jacket, the other with a cream coloured sweater and a plaid skirt. "This is IF and Compa. They'll be part of your mission for recovering Chika and Vert's powers." Maxi nodded and shook hands with both girls.

"Pleased to meet you both. Glad to be working with you." Maxi said, greeting them politely.

"Of course Mr. Maxi! I'm happy to be working with you too!" Compa chirped. As bubbly as she seemed, Maxi could sense that she was a pretty decent healer. Maybe there was more to her than he could note simply by looking. He turned to If and she gave him a nod.

"I'll do my best. You can guarantee that I'll at least take care of Nep's antics for you." Maxi nodded with a bit of a giggle.

"I appreciate that, both of you." The doorbell went off again. "Fuckin' hell, we're just getting all the new party members RIGHT now, aren't we?" Maxi opened the door to be greeted by a pistol in his face. With reflexes faster than should be possible, Maxi punched straight upwards, shattering the pistol in the user's hand. The girl recoiled back, her friend stepping forward with a sword.

"Don't worry, Uni! Rom, Ram, and I will handle this!" Felicia and Kupo came out to his sides. These girls looked rather familiar to him, but now wasn't the time to assess that. The gods give you lemons, you eat the lemons, then you see if they've got anything left to throw at you. Also, Maxi just really liked lemons. He was more for limes, but he'd roll with what he had. He sprung up into the air, brandishing his spear, landing on the far side of the field. Felicia had her dual handguns and daggers, while Kupo was equipped with a rifle, an exoskeleton similar to his own, and a rather special boomerang. He also had a rather special robo-pet, and Maxi had Sancho on his shoulder. The parakeet was wearing a robotic suit of armor, sporting his own set of equipment.

'You know, on your face might be a better place for me.' Myous noted last moment.

"Not the time, Myous." Maxi responded quickly. The pink haired one went at him, shouting something, then swinging a sword at him several times. Maxi was quick enough to block most of those attacks. Kupo seemed to be occupied with the raven-haired girl who'd had the pistol before, now she had several other types of guns. Felicia, on the other hand, was having a lovely time throwing daggers and stones at two girls who were trying to loose some kind of magic at her. "Not what I had in mind when I answered the door, but I guess it'll be just as well. Might as well get warmed up here." Maxi blocked the girl's sword with his spear, then turned back around and clocked the back of her head with the back of the spear. The girl fell to her knees, not completely disabled, but Maxi could see that Kupo need a hand. He sprung high into the air, and came down, slamming the spear into the ground, the resulting shock-wave throwing the girl through the air. Kupo loaded up a sleeping dart and shot the girl mid-air, the girl falling to the ground, sleeping. Felicia was already done on her end, the two girls laying in the ground, seemingly knocked out. He gave her a thumbs up. The pink-haired girl from before didn't seem to be quite down. Throwing something in the air, her friends got back up.

"We will save our sisters!" she yelled out, a beam of light making all of them transform. Maxi had seen that before. He also knew that he had nothing to quell the situation, so this was about to get really interesting.

'Now might be a good time to get me on your face.' Myous insisted. For whatever reason, Maxi complied, sticking the mask on properly, and sending Felicia and Kupo back inside to get the girls. Even if they couldn't calm these new girls down, they would at least provide some help. Maxi's vision tinted a slightly orangey colour, and it took him a moment to realize that this wasn't just his head messing with him, he actually had an orange aura. With a flip and a masterful swipe, Maxi spun through the air and slammed his spear down, crashing the girls away from him. The raven-haired girl (Uni, they called her?) open fired, but Sancho had him covered, firing off a volley of lasers to counter the bullets. The two magic girls (Rom and Ram, right?) began to launch icicles and freezing spells at Maxi, but Maxi was quick to counter. Swinging his spear in concise and quick motions, he deflected, or in some cases reflected, the spells and icicles, leaving the girls with nothing but some ice damage and drained mana pools. He turned to the pink haired girl. His aura strengthened as he charged, spinning the spear, countering each swing, giving his own attacks, slowly chipping the girl's health down until she only had a measly few left. The girl took a step back to reconsider her situation, but Maxi had no intention of letting her recover. Rushing forth, he was about to deliver the final blow, when suddenly, he swiped his arm to the side. The girl's eyes wen't wide, but she was still alive. The point of the spear had missed her torso by a few inches, a choice Maxi made within a moment. This girl had a life ahead of her, and, if he was guessing correctly, a sister, and probably someone he knew at that. He collapsed the spear and stashed the capsule for later. He offered the girl a hand in getting back up.

"Right, let's try that introduction again, yes?" After introducing himself and negating the want to beat the crap out of him, and also taking Myous off his face and dispersing his aura, Maxi was at peace, sitting in his kitchen, munching on some oatmeal raisin cookies. Felicia brought out a batch of peanut butter cookies which Rom and Ram eagerly dug into. Maxi made note of that. "So then, Nepgear, Uni, Rom, Ram, I hope there are no hard feelings about earlier." He got mostly positive responses from all four girls. "Why don't you go talk to your sisters, I'm sure they're all dying to see you again, I'm gonna go recover, Chika, Vert's powers, and probably Blanc's powers while I'm at it." As complex as that seemed, he said it with a straight face and a confident tone, so no one questioned. Oliver headed off, getting ready to recover the items and get out.

Arfoire had a base set up in this dimension, something like a combination of a military base and a castle. Maxi couldn't handle this alone. He was going to need some assistance here. conveniently enough, he knew just who to call for this. He'd just made a sword for the boy's mother. He needed Jayden.

* * *

 **So here's the deal... I'm planning to fuse this story into Paradox, and I've been planning this for a while, and then I'm going to use this story to introduce some other characters before things get really confusing.** So... you've been warned now. Next chapter, or even this chapter, might be the last of Maxi in this version of the story. Maxi's adventure is going to be continuing over in Parado **x, so make sure you head on over if you want to see where this is going to go next. I'm super tired, and it's like, really late, so let's do this outro.**

 _ **An edit from Maxi: yeah... Ignore the non-bolded comment I marked above. I think 24 was too tired for his own good when he wrote this, that's like, not true at all, there should be like, two more chapters. Just wanted to let everyone know.**_

 **So then, as always, I hope you all have a lovely evening, and, be it here or anywhere elsewhere, may we meet again upon another chapter. See ya!**


	8. Chapter 8

**How many people are disappointed that this isn't the actual chapter? I'm super sorry about that. Here's the deal. Chapters nine and ten are going to have a huge amount of content, and then chapters eleven and twelve are going to tie up the series. I know that I've already taken way too long on this project, so making a huge amount of content is my way of making it up to you guys. Make no mistake, those last chapters are coming, they're just taking much longer than I originally anticipated. Sorry about that, guys! This is also a mini chapter with Maxi and Myself along with a few others. I hope you enjoy this mini filler chapter! Sorry it's not the real deal!**

* * *

I stretched wide as I closed my laptop and got ready to go to bed. It was ten o' clock and I had done a lot of work and other things such as running around and catching pokemon on my phone, so naturally, I was pretty tired. Just as soon as my head went down, however, Maxi had picked it back up, reopened my laptop, set it in my lap, and was seated next to me.

"You promised we'd work on the next chapters today." Maxi told me. Sure enough, I could remember promising him something along those lines, "Can we just do a little bit now and maybe do some more tomorrow?" he asked, "I get that you're tired but... it's been four months I think... I've lost track."

"No, no." I reassured him, "You're right. Let's get some work done." It was twelve twenty one by the time we stopped, and not by choice. Both Maxi and I had fallen asleep in front of the laptop. Yes, that technically means we both slept in the same bed, but if I'm gonna sleep with another guy, I figure Maxi's not such a bad choice, especially considering that we're both pretty good friends. That aside, I woke up in the morning and got straight back to it. By the time I was done at the end of the morning, I had just a little less than two thirds of the whole thing done, but on the downside, my hands were cramped like there was no tomorrow. I frowned. "This is not the end..." I muttered.

"Soon... soon..."


End file.
